Published November 5, 2020 | Version v,1
Journal article Open

The interplay between cancer biology and the endocannabinoid system—significance for cancer risk, prognosis and response to treatment

  • 1. Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biomedicine, Faculty of Biology, University of Barcelona, 08028 Barcelona, Spain; Institute of Biomedicine of the University of Barcelona (IBUB), 08028 Barcelona, Spain
  • 2. Department of Experimental Oncology, Institute for Oncology and Radiology of Serbia, Pasterova 14, 11000 Belgrade, Serbia; milena.cavic@ncrc.ac.rs (M.C.); krivokuca.ana@gmail.com (A.K.)
  • 3. Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biomedicine, Faculty of Biology, University of Barcelona, 08028 Barcelona, Spain; Institute of Biomedicine of the University of Barcelona (IBUB), 08028 Barcelona, Spain;

Description

Simple Summary: This review analyses the complex involvement of the various components of the endocannabinoid system (ECS) in the susceptibility to cancer, prognosis, and response to treatment, focusing on its relationship with cancer biology in selected solid cancers (breast, gastrointestinal, gynaecological, prostate cancer, thoracic, thyroid, central nervous system (CNS) tumours, and melanoma). The same ECS component can exert both protective and pathogenic effects in different tumour subtypes, which are often pathologically driven by different biological factors. Although an attractive target in cancer, the use of components in anti-cancer treatment is still interlinked with many legal and ethical issues that need to be considered. The legislation which outlines the permissive boundaries of their therapeutic use in oncology is still unable to follow the current scientific burden of evidence, but the number of ongoing clinical trials might tip the scale forward in the near future.

Notes

This work was supported by the "Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad" and European Regional Development Funds of the European Union (Grant No. SAF2017-87629-R) and the Ministry of Education,Science and Technological Development of the Republic of Serbia (451-03-68/2020-14/200043).

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The interplay between cancer biology and the endocannabinoid system...cancers-12-03275-v2.pdf

Additional details

Related works

Is identical to
PMC7694406 (pmcid)
Is part of
2072-6694 (ISSN)

Funding

Application of biomedical engineering for preclinical and clinical practice 41007
Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development