Prevention of cancer metastasis "Nature" research finds the key to make cancer cells "sleepy"

Avoiding cancer metastasis is an important challenge in curing cancer

These cancer cells originated from the original tumor, and after metastasis to other organs of the body, they can be inactive for a long time, as if dormant

Recently, researchers from the University of Basel have gained important insights into the mechanism behind tumor dormancy

The researchers used mouse models and human tissue samples to determine how tumor cells migrated from the original breast tumor to the liver, and how they stay dormant and wake up

"Hypnotic" Cells and "Wake Up" Cells

Among them, the one responsible for "hypnosis" tumor cells is "natural killer cell" (NK, natural killer cell)

Another type of cell is actually responsible for "waking up" tumor cells.

"There are many reasons why hepatic stellate cells are activated, such as chronic inflammation or persistent infection in the body

▲The mechanism that affects tumor cell dormancy (picture source: reference [2])

Potential methods to prevent tumor metastasis

Based on the above findings, the paper proposes several promising methods to prevent cancer cell metastasis

The first is to try to prolong the "dormant" state of tumor cells, such as immunotherapy based on interleukin-15

The second is to relieve the inhibitory effect of hepatic stellate cells on NK cells

Note: The original text has been deleted

Reference materials:

[1] Correia, AL, et, al.

[2] Noella Lopes & Eric Vivier (2021) Natural killer cells lull tumours into dormancy.

[3] Researchers identify how to prevent cancer metastases.