title: Oncolytic virotherapy of gynecologic malignancies.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Gynecologic cancer is still the third leading cause of cancer death among women in the US. Therapeutics employing novel mechanisms of action are therefore urgently needed. Oncolytic viruses (OVs) selectively infecting and replicating in cancer cells have recently attracted considerable interest as promising anti-cancer agents. Here, we provide an overview of different OVs currently being used for virotherapy of gynecologic cancers and discuss challenges and implications for their future development.
  
  
  METHODS
  Relevant literature obtained from the PubMed database by searching for articles including the terms "oncolytic" or "virus", or "virotherapy" as well as "ovarian" or "cervical" was thoroughly reviewed.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Preclinical in vivo models as well as early clinical trials demonstrated safety and efficacy when targeting gynecologic malignancies with OVs.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  While gaining more and more insight into the underlying molecular mechanisms of OVs, virotherapy represents an appealing approach to fight gynecologic malignancies.
authors.affiliation: Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, University of Tuebingen, Calwer Strasse 7, 72076 Tuebingen, Germany. andreas.hartkopf@med.uni-tuebingen.de
authors.forename: Andreas D
authors.initials: AD
authors.lastname: Hartkopf
authors.forename: Tanja
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Fehm
authors.forename: Diethelm
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Wallwiener
authors.forename: Ulrich
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Lauer
mesh_terms: D005260:Female; D005833:Genital Neoplasms, Female / Q000628:therapy* / Q000821:virology*; D006801:Humans; D050130:Oncolytic Virotherapy / Q000379:methods*; D050504:Oncolytic Viruses