Department of Hepatobiliary Surgery, The First Affiliated Hospital of Medical College, Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an, Shaanxi, China.
Curr Pharm Des. 2012;18(17):2395-403. doi: 10.2174/13816128112092395.
Pancreatic cancer is one of the most fatal human malignancies. Though a relatively rare malignancy, it remains one of the deadliest tumors, with an extremely high mortality rate. The prognosis of patients with pancreatic cancer remains poor; only patients with small tumors and complete resection have a chance of a complete cure. Pancreatic cancer responds poorly to conventional therapies, including chemotherapy and irradiation. Tumor-specific targeted therapy is a relatively recent addition to the arsenal of anti-cancer therapies. It is important to find novel targets to distinguish tumor cells from their normal counterparts in therapeutic approaches. In the past few decades, studies have revealed the molecular mechanisms of pancreatic tumorigenesis, growth, invasion and metastasis. The proteins that participate in the pathophysiological processes of pancreatic cancer might be potential targets for therapy. This review describes the main players in perineural invasion, hypoxia and desmoplasia and the molecular mechanisms of these pathophysiological processes.
胰腺癌是最致命的人类恶性肿瘤之一。尽管胰腺癌相对罕见，但它仍是最致命的肿瘤之一，死亡率极高。胰腺癌患者的预后仍然很差；只有肿瘤较小且完全切除的患者才有完全治愈的机会。胰腺癌对包括化疗和放疗在内的常规疗法反应不佳。肿瘤特异性靶向治疗是抗癌疗法的一个相对较新的补充。在治疗方法中找到区分肿瘤细胞与其正常细胞的新靶点非常重要。在过去几十年中，研究揭示了胰腺肿瘤发生、生长、侵袭和转移的分子机制。参与胰腺癌病理生理过程的蛋白质可能是治疗的潜在靶点。本文描述了神经周围浸润、缺氧和纤维组织增生的主要参与者以及这些病理生理过程的分子机制。
