The sleeping threat: targeting cancer dormancy to transform metastasis therapy

Willis, R. A. The Spread of Tumours in the Human Body (J. A. Churchill, 1934).

Hadfield, G. The dormant cancer cell. Br. Med. J. 2, 607–610 (1954).

Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Aguirre-Ghiso, J. A. & Sosa, M. S. Emerging topics on disseminated cancer cell dormancy and the paradigm of metastasis. Annu. Rev. Cancer Biol. 2, 377–393 (2018).

Article  Google Scholar 

Sosa, M. S., Bragado, P. & Aguirre-Ghiso, J. A. Mechanisms of disseminated cancer cell dormancy: an awakening field. Nat. Rev. Cancer 14, 611–622 (2014).

Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Aguirre-Ghiso, J. A. Models, mechanisms and clinical evidence for cancer dormancy. Nat. Rev. Cancer 7, 834–846 (2007).

Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Ossowski, L. & Aguirre-Ghiso, J. A. Urokinase receptor and integrin partnership: coordination of signaling for cell adhesion, migration and growth. Curr. Opin. Cell Biol. 12, 613–620 (2000).

Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Aguirre Ghiso, J. A., Kovalski, K. & Ossowski, L. Tumor dormancy induced by downregulation of urokinase receptor in human carcinoma involves integrin and MAPK signaling. J. Cell Biol. 147, 89–104 (1999). A cancer cell dormancy mechanism showing that a reciprocal crosstalk between the ECM microenvironment and cancer cell controls dormancy.

Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Ghajar, C. M. Metastasis prevention by targeting the dormant niche. Nat. Rev. Cancer 15, 238–247 (2015).

Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Phan, T. G. & Croucher, P. I. The dormant cancer cell life cycle. Nat. Rev. Cancer 20, 398–411 (2020).

Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Agudo, J. et al. Targeting cancer cell dormancy. Nat. Rev. Cancer 24, 97–104 (2024).

Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Aguirre-Ghiso, J. A. How dormant cancer persists and reawakens. Science 361, 1314–1315 (2018).

Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Schardt, J. A. et al. Genomic analysis of single cytokeratin-positive cells from bone marrow reveals early mutational events in breast cancer. Cancer Cell 8, 227–239 (2005).

Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Klein, C. A. Cancer progression and the invisible phase of metastatic colonization. Nat. Rev. Cancer 20, 681–694 (2020).

Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Klein, C. A. Framework models of tumor dormancy from patient-derived observations. Curr. Opin. Genet. Dev. 21, 42–49 (2011).

Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Harper, K. L. et al. Mechanism of early dissemination and metastasis in Her2+ mammary cancer. Nature 540, 588–592 (2016). A mechanism of early breast cancer dissemination showing that oncogene and stress pathways drive the first wave of dormant DCCs.

Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Hosseini, H. et al. Early dissemination seeds metastasis in breast cancer. Nature 540, 552–558 (2016). A mechanism of early breast cancer dissemination showing a link between oncogene, hormone receptor and cell density signalling.

Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Rodriguez-Tirado, C. & Sosa, M. S. How much do we know about the metastatic process? Clin. Exp. Metastasis https://doi.org/10.1007/s10585-023-10248-0 (2024).

Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Quesnel, B. Tumor dormancy and immunoescape. APMIS 116, 685–694 (2008).

Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Holmgren, L., O’Reilly, M. S. & Folkman, J. Dormancy of micrometastases: balanced proliferation and apoptosis in the presence of angiogenesis suppression. Nat. Med. 1, 149–153 (1995).

Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Risson, E., Nobre, A. R., Maguer-Satta, V. & Aguirre-Ghiso, J. A. The current paradigm and challenges ahead for the dormancy of disseminated tumor cells. Nat. Cancer 1, 672–680 (2020).

Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Dalla, E., Sreekumar, A., Aguirre-Ghiso, J. A. & Chodosh, L. A. Dormancy in breast cancer. Cold Spring Harb. Perspect. Med. 13, a041331 (2023).

Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Linde, N. et al. Macrophages orchestrate breast cancer early dissemination and metastasis. Nat. Commun. 9, 21 (2018).

Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Nobre, A. R. et al. ZFP281 drives a mesenchymal-like dormancy program in early disseminated breast cancer cells that prevents metastatic outgrowth in the lung. Nat. Cancer 3, 1165–1180 (2022). Evidence that the pluripotency transcription factor ZFP281 orchestrates a mesenchymal-like programme in early disseminated breast cancer cells that both promotes their early spread and locks them into long-term dormancy.

Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Calvo, V. et al. A PERK-Specific inhibitor blocks metastatic progression by limiting integrated stress response-dependent survival of quiescent cancer cells. Clin. Cancer Res. 29, 5155–5172 (2023). Evidence that a highly specific, clinical-grade PERK inhibitor can block metastatic progression by selectively killing ISR-high dormant disseminated cancer cells.

Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Wilson, A. et al. Hematopoietic stem cells reversibly switch from dormancy to self-renewal during homeostasis and repair. Cell 135, 1118–1129 (2008).

Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Wilson, A. et al. Dormant and self-renewing hematopoietic stem cells and their niches. Ann. N. Y. Acad. Sci. 1106, 64–75 (2007).

Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Bernitz, J. M., Kim, H. S., MacArthur, B., Sieburg, H. & Moore, K. Hematopoietic stem cells count and remember self-renewal divisions. Cell 167, 1296–1309.e1210 (2016).

Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Demicheli, R., Terenziani, M. & Bonadonna, G. Estimate of tumor growth time for breast cancer local recurrences: rapid growth after wake-up? Breast Cancer Res. Treat. 51, 133–137 (1998).

Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Page, K. & Uhr, J. W. Mathematical models of cancer dormancy. Leuk. Lymphoma 46, 313–327 (2005).

Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Blath, J., Kraut, A., Paul, T. & Tobias, A. A stochastic population model for the impact of cancer cell dormancy on therapy success. J. Theor. Biol. 597, 111995 (2025).

Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Pantel, K., Alix-Panabieres, C. & Riethdorf, S. Cancer micrometastases. Nat. Rev. Clin. Oncol. 6, 339–351 (2009).

Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Borgen, E. et al. NR2F1 stratifies dormant disseminated tumor cells in breast cancer patients. Breast Cancer Res. 20, 1–13 (2018). Use of a dormancy marker in clinical sudies showing that detection of NR2F1 in human DCCs is correlated with longer survival rates.

Comments (0)

No login
gif