AJP-Cell Physiology begins a Theme on "Cellular Processes in Tumour Metastasis - From Basic Research to Translation"

Eric Chevet (1)

1 COSS - Chemistry, Oncogenesis, Stress and Signaling

Cancers are so life-threatening not so much because of the ability of cancerous tumors to develop rapidly as by the risk of the spreading of tumor cells out of their originatation site. This proces is called metastasis. The term "metastasis" was proposed in 1829 in the context of cancer by Joseph Claude Recamier, a French physician who was the first to report anatomical observations in his book entitled "Recherche sur le traitement du cancer" that showed that the metastases came from the emigration of cancer cells out of the primary (breast) tumor and of their transplant into organs distant from the home of the primary cancer (5). Metastases cause 90% of the patient mortality due to malignant carcinomas. Unfortunately, it should be noted that the prognosis of a patient with metastatic cancer is not much better now than it was ten or twenty years ago. Indeed, many patients, at the time of diagnosis, already have occult metastases (also known as micrometastases). These render the surgical or radiotherapeutic action ineffective, since it these treatments eradicate only the primary tumor and leave in place the secondary tumors. Later these may develop and current chemotherapeutic treatments are rarely effective. This explains the urgency to find new type(s) of chemotherapy targeted at metastatic disease and the need to better understand the biological mechanisms that are implemented during metastatic progression.

Domaines: Cancer; Biologie cellulaire

Eric Chevet. AJP-Cell Physiology begins a Theme on "Cellular Processes in Tumour Metastasis - From Basic Research to Translation". American Journal of Physiology - Cell Physiology, 2019, 317 (5), pp.C867-C868. ⟨10.1152/ajpcell.00379.2019⟩. ⟨hal-02307453⟩