Lu Fatai, Zhu Yingkang, Zhang Guodong, Liu Zunpeng
Department of Orthopedics, The Fourth Affiliated Hospital of China Medical University, Shenyang, China.
Front Pharmacol. 2022 Aug 23;13:944147. doi: 10.3389/fphar.2022.944147. eCollection 2022.
In many organisms, antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) display wide activities in innate host defense against microbial pathogens. Mammalian AMPs include the cathelicidin and defensin families. LL37 is the only one member of the cathelicidin family of host defense peptides expressed in humans. Since its discovery, it has become clear that they have pleiotropic effects. In addition to its antibacterial properties, many studies have shown that LL37 is also involved in a wide variety of biological activities, including tissue repair, inflammatory responses, hemotaxis, and chemokine induction. Moreover, recent studies suggest that LL37 exhibits the intricate and contradictory effects in promoting or inhibiting tumor growth. Indeed, an increasing amount of evidence suggests that human LL37 including its fragments and analogs shows anticancer effects on many kinds of cancer cell lines, although LL37 is also involved in cancer progression. Focusing on recent information, in this review, we explore and summarize how LL37 contributes to anticancer effect as well as discuss the strategies to enhance delivery of this peptide and selectivity for cancer cells.
在许多生物体中,抗菌肽(AMPs)在宿主针对微生物病原体的固有防御中表现出广泛的活性。哺乳动物的抗菌肽包括cathelicidin和防御素家族。LL37是人类表达的宿主防御肽cathelicidin家族中的唯一成员。自发现以来,很明显它们具有多效性作用。除了其抗菌特性外,许多研究表明LL37还参与多种生物学活性,包括组织修复、炎症反应、趋化性和趋化因子诱导。此外,最近的研究表明LL37在促进或抑制肿瘤生长方面表现出复杂且矛盾的作用。事实上,越来越多的证据表明,包括其片段和类似物在内的人LL37对多种癌细胞系具有抗癌作用,尽管LL37也参与癌症进展。基于最近的信息,在本综述中,我们探讨并总结了LL37如何促成抗癌作用,并讨论了增强该肽递送以及提高对癌细胞选择性的策略。