Radiotherapy for Esophageal Cancer: Molecular Mechanism and Novel Targets to Improve Radiosensitivity

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About this Research Topic

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Background

Esophageal Cancer is a major malignant tumor worldwide. Radiotherapy is one of the main strategies for esophageal cancer treatment. Radiotherapy aims to maximize damage to cancer cells, while minimizing damage to healthy cells. But radiotherapy alone is not effective. A range of 70%-80% of patients have uncontrolled local tumor lesions, as well as tumor recurrence in the radiation target area. Resistance to radiation therapy is polymodal and associated with a number of biological alterations both within the tumor itself and in the surrounding microenvironment. Studies on key molecules in the signal pathways or immune escape process is expected to reveal the molecular mechanism of esophageal cancer radio-resistance, and to provide new strategies for improving the radiosensitivity of cancer cells and reducing the rate of local recurrence.

The goal of this Research Topic is to elucidate molecular and cellular signaling dysregulation in esophagus cancer, and focus on how to increase the effect of radiotherapy on esophagus cancer.

We welcome Original Research, Review, Mini-review and Prospective studies in the subtopics, including but not limited to:

• Research on the mechanism for increasing the radiation sensitivity of esophageal cancer in vivo and in vitro
• Examination of molecular mechanism of dynamic interactions between the immune cells and tumor cells in esophagus cancer
• Exploration of novel upstream, downstream or crosstalk between key signaling pathways involved in esophageal cancer tumorigenesis, angiogenesis and progression
• Radiotherapy-related signal pathways involving cell cycle, apoptosis, reactive oxygen species, mitochondrial membrane
• Identification of novel potential predictive biomarkers predicting the effect of radiotherapy
• The synergy of radiotherapy and novel modalities including DNA-targeting agents, antimetabolic agents, antiangiogenic agents and immune treatment
• Multi omics studies on radiotherapy for Esophageal Cancer with sound validation (e.g. prospective studies involving large patient cohorts, etc.)

Please note: manuscripts consisting solely of bioinformatics or computational analysis of public genomic or transcriptomic databases which are not accompanied by validation (independent cohort or biological validation in vitro or in vivo) are out of scope for this section and will not be accepted as part of this Research Topic.

Keywords: Esophageal Cancer, biology, signaling pathways, radiotherapy, mechanism

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