The Role of Autophagy in Childhood Central Nervous System Tumors

• Opinion statement Autophagy is a physiological process that occurs in normal tissues. Under external environmental pressure or internal environmental changes, cells can digest part of their contents through autophagy in order to reduce metabolic pressure or remove damaged organelles. In cancer, autophagy plays a paradoxical role, acting as a tumor suppressor-by removing damaged organelles and inhibiting inflammation or by promoting genome stability and the tumor-adaptive responses-as a pro-survival mechanism to protect cells from stress. In this article, we review the autophagy-dependent mechanisms driving childhood central nervous system tumor cell death, malignancy invasion, chemosensitivity, and radiosensitivity. Autophagy inhibitors and inducers have been developed, and encouraging results have been achieved in autophagy modulation, suggesting that these might be potential therapeutic agents for the treatment of pediatric central nervous system (CNS) tumors.

Subject headings

MEDICIN OCH HÄLSOVETENSKAP  -- Klinisk medicin -- Cancer och onkologi (hsv//swe)

MEDICAL AND HEALTH SCIENCES  -- Clinical Medicine -- Cancer and Oncology (hsv//eng)

Keyword

Autophagy

Children

Central nervous system tumors

Cell death

Chemosensitivity

Radiosensitivity

epithelial-mesenchymal transition

n-cadherin expression

brain

growth

atg7

chemosensitivity

crosstalk

mechanism

apoptosis

invasion

Oncology

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

art (subject category)