title: Drug Repurposing in Anticancer Reagent Development.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Cancer is a complex disease and a huge threat to human health. The prognosis for some cancer types such as breast cancer has improved dramatically over the past 50 years due to rapid development of surgery, chemotherapy and radiotherapy technologies. However, for many patients bearing unresectable cancers, the prognosis remained poor. For this reason, there is always high demand for newer and better therapeutic reagents in cancer field. But the development of anticancer drugs is risky, lengthy and costly. Not many new anticancer reagents come into market every year.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  This review focuses on the latest progress of chemotherapy drug repurposing in cancer research.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  It is clear from the review of that drug repurposing is faster and cheaper than conventional drug development process. The anticancer efficacy of numerous non-cancer drugs are being tested now. However, not many of them have obtained enough evidence to go into clinical trials for cancer treatment. How to filter the right candidate and narrow the gap between bench and bed remains a hurdle for both conventional and repurposing drug development.
authors.affiliation: College of Life Sciences, Fujian Normal University, Fuzhou, Fujian Province. China.
authors.forename: Peng-Chen
authors.initials: PC
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.affiliation: United Innovation of Mengchao Hepatobiliary Technology Key Laboratory of Fujian Province, MengchaoHepatobiliary Hospital of Fujian Medical University, Fuzhou, Fujian Province, 350025. China.
authors.forename: Xaiolong
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: College of Life Sciences, Qishan Campus, Fujian Normal University, Fuzhou, Fujian Province, 350117. China.
authors.forename: Yao
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Lin
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D000970:Antineoplastic Agents / Q000494:pharmacology / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D058492:Drug Repositioning / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D058990:Molecular Targeted Therapy / Q000379:methods; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000188:drug therapy* / Q000378:metabolism; D015398:Signal Transduction / Q000187:drug effects
chemical_list: D000970:Antineoplastic Agents
keywords: Drug repurposing; cancer; cellular experiments; mechanism; signaling pathway; target