The growing attention of biomedical research towards gender medicine is due to the emergence that incidence, prognosis, and mortality rates of several types of cancers are profoundly influenced by gender and can therefore differ between females and males. In addition to genetic and behavioral factors that can contribute to this disparity, sex hormones certainly appear to have a relevant role in modulating the evolution of some types of tumors in men and in women. Indeed, sex hormones may regulate, by direct and/or indirect mechanisms, the expression of crucial molecular actors involved in cell growth and proliferation. Moreover, these hormones regulate important cellular pathways related to inflammation, oxidative stress, metabolism, and immune response, thus influencing tumor etiology and progression and ultimately impacting tumor prognosis. Understanding the mechanisms that control the sex hormones effects in cancer will be fundamental, not only for understanding new pathways involved in cancer progression but also for developing an adequate therapeutic response. This could therefore be essential to identify potential gender-related prognostic and predictive markers, and ultimately develop personalized therapies.

The purpose of this Research Topic is to provide an updated overview of the role of gender difference in tumor etiology and progression. In particular, the aim is to summarise the state of art and knowledge by integrating review article contributions with innovative aspects and data from original article contributions. The focus of such articles could be either clinical or pre-clinical but the overall scope of the issue is to provide a platform that describes how sex hormones participate in tumorigenesis and how gender could be an important aspect to consider when it comes to anticancer therapies' effectiveness and response.

Given the involvement of sex hormones in regulating numerous cancer-related aspects, the Research Topic may include the following themes:

- Gender impact in modulating the signaling pathways driven by oncogenes and tumor suppressors;

- The regulation of tumor metabolic reprogramming by sex hormones signaling;

- Gender regulation of oxidative state in cancer cells;

- The role of gender in sustaining the inflammation in tumor microenvironment;

- The implication of gender in modulating the immune response in cancer;

- The impact of gender on therapy response and resistance;

In addition to the above-summarised topics, this Research Topic will welcome all manuscripts revealing direct or indirect mechanisms through which sex hormones can act and concur to tumor progression and to the development of anticancer therapy resistance.

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Frontiers in Endocrinology

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