Renal cell carcinoma (RCC) is the seventh most frequently diagnosed tumor in adults in Europe and represents approximately 2.5% of cancer deaths. In metastatic setting, clinical strategies including angiogenesis inhibition with tyrosine kinase inhibitors, as well as immunotherapy against immune checkpoint proteins, such as PD-1/PDL-1 and CTLA-4, have revolutionized the treatment landscape.
Unfortunately, most patients progress to anti angiogenic and immunotherapy treatment. Epigenetic aberrations are commonly found in RCC, showing that changes in epigenetic modifications, like promoter methylation or abnormal microRNA expression, are key in the development of RCC due to gene expression alterations without changes in the genome sequence. Nowadays, new drugs in the field of epigenetics are able to modify gene expression to induce antitumoral effect in the tumor cell. In kidney cancer, drugs targeting epigenetics are in early development, but could be promising in the near future. In this review, we summarize the main epigenetic alterations found in RCC and their involvement in pathological signaling pathways, being a new potential target that could potentially be added to the treatment flow of patients with advanced RCC.
Critical reviews in oncology/hematology. 2022 Oct 15 [Epub ahead of print]
Javier Molina-Cerrillo, Matteo Santoni, Álvaro Ruiz, Francesco Massari, Javier Pozas, Ignacio Ortego, Victoria Gómez, Enrique Grande, Teresa Alonso-Gordoa
Medical Oncology Department, Hospital Universitario Ramón y Cajal. Medicine School, Alcalá University, Madrid, Spain. Electronic address: ., Oncology Unit, Macerata Hospital, Macerata, Italy., Medical Oncology Department, Hospital Universitario Ramón y Cajal. Medicine School, Alcalá University, Madrid, Spain., Medical Oncology, IRCCS Azienda Ospedaliero-Universitaria di Bologna, Bologna - Italia., Medical Oncology Department. MD Anderson Cancer Center Madrid, Madrid, Spain.
PubMed http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36257538