Development of Inhibitors Targeting Hypoxia-Inducible Factor 1 and 2 for Cancer Therapy

Hypoxia is frequently observed in solid tumors and also one of the major obstacles for effective cancer therapies. Cancer cells take advantage of their ability to adapt hypoxia to initiate a special transcriptional program that renders them more aggressive biological behaviors. Hypoxia-inducible fac...

Full description

Saved in:

Bibliographic Details
Published in:	Yonsei medical journal 2017, 58(3), , pp.489-496
Main Authors:	Yu, Tianchi, Tang, Bo, Sun, Xueying
Format:	Article
Language:	eng
Subjects:	Antineoplastic Agents - pharmacology Basic Helix-Loop-Helix Transcription Factors - genetics Basic Helix-Loop-Helix Transcription Factors - physiology Genes, Tumor Suppressor - physiology Humans Hypoxia-Inducible Factor 1 - genetics Hypoxia-Inducible Factor 1 - physiology Hypoxia-Inducible Factor 1, alpha Subunit - antagonists & inhibitors Hypoxia-Inducible Factor 1, alpha Subunit - metabolism Neoplasms - drug therapy Neoplasms - genetics Neoplasms - pathology Neoplasms - therapy Review RNA, Messenger - genetics Transcriptional Activation 의학일반
Online Access:	Get full text
Tags:	Add Tag No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!

Description
Summary:	Hypoxia is frequently observed in solid tumors and also one of the major obstacles for effective cancer therapies. Cancer cells take advantage of their ability to adapt hypoxia to initiate a special transcriptional program that renders them more aggressive biological behaviors. Hypoxia-inducible factors (HIFs) are the key factors that control hypoxia-inducible pathways by regulating the expression of a vast array of genes involved in cancer progression and treatment resistance. HIFs, mainly HIF-1 and -2, have become potential targets for developing novel cancer therapeutics. This article reviews the updated information in tumor HIF pathways, particularly recent advances in the development of HIF inhibitors. These inhibitors interfere with mRNA expression, protein synthesis, protein degradation and dimerization, DNA binding and transcriptional activity of HIF-1 and -2, or both. Despite efforts in the past two decades, no agents directly inhibiting HIFs have been approved for treating cancer patients. By analyzing results of the published reports, we put the perspectives at the end of the article. The therapeutic efficacy of HIF inhibitors may be improved if more efforts are devoted on developing agents that are able to simultaneously target HIF-1 and -2, increasing the penetrating capacity of HIF inhibitors, and selecting suitable patient subpopulations for clinical trials.
ISSN:	0513-5796 1976-2437