title: The dual role of autophagy in cancer.
abstract: Autophagy is a mechanism for the degradation of cytoplasmic material, damaged organelles and aggregate-prone proteins in lysosomes. Recent evidence indicates that autophagy is a tumor suppressor mechanism, which is connected to its role in the clearance of the scaffold protein p62/SQSTM1 and prevention of oxidative stress and genomic instability. However, since autophagy is a survival mechanism, cancer cells can also exploit it to survive nutrient limitation and hypoxia that often occur in solid tumors. Tumor cells can also upregulate autophagy as a response to cancer treatment, and recent studies show that inhibition of autophagy can enhance the killing of tumor cells after treatment. Interestingly, the FK506-binding protein 51 plays a role in the autophagy-linked radiation resistance of malignant melanoma.
authors.affiliation: University of Helsinki, Department of Biosciences, Helsinki, Finland. eeva-liisa.eskelinen@helsinki.fi
authors.forename: Eeva-Liisa
authors.initials: EL
authors.lastname: Eskelinen
mesh_terms: D048868:Adaptor Proteins, Signal Transducing / Q000378:metabolism*; D000818:Animals; D001343:Autophagy; D015687:Cell Hypoxia; D042822:Genomic Instability; D006801:Humans; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000473:pathology* / Q000628:therapy; D018384:Oxidative Stress; D000071456:Sequestosome-1 Protein; D022021:Tacrolimus Binding Proteins / Q000378:metabolism; D000099159:Tacrolimus Binding Protein 5
chemical_list: D048868:Adaptor Proteins, Signal Transducing; D000071456:Sequestosome-1 Protein; D022021:Tacrolimus Binding Proteins; D000099159:Tacrolimus Binding Protein 5; C099718:SQSTM1 protein, human