Innovative Multidisciplinary Insights into the Gut-Liver Axis and Cancer

The gut-liver axis is a critical interplay in the development of severe health issues including hepatitis, alcoholic liver disease, cirrhosis, and notably, hepatocellular carcinoma. Highlighting its importance, current research underscores microbial influences on the tumor microenvironment (TME), evidencing both local and systemic interactions facilitated by microbiota. These insights emerge amidst growing recognition that the gut-liver linkage and their symbiotic relationship with microbiota actively mediate carcinogenic processes. Such interactions pivotally influence metabolic and genetic pathways in the liver, with even minor disturbances potentially triggering carcinogenesis. Recent findings suggest a microbial shift through the portal vein may expose the liver to metabolic products originating in the gut, impacting cellular behaviors and contributing to cancer development.

This Research Topic aims to deepen understanding of the complex interactions between the gut and liver and highlight how this knowledge could forge new therapeutic approaches. By investigating how microbes and metabolic byproducts from the gut influence liver activity, we can potentially identify novel intervention targets. Exploration into molecular inhibitors, immunological changes, and the role of the microbiome in carcinogenesis is expected to shift current therapeutic paradigms, leveraging groundbreaking research techniques including organoids and bioinformatics.

To gather further insights in the multifaceted relationship between the gut and liver and their impact on cancer progression, we welcome articles addressing, but not limited to, the following themes:

General principles of gut-liver axis in cancer (hepatic and gastric).
Tumor microenvironment and microbiota crosstalk.
Designing of therapeutics using the gut-liver axis.
Influence of microbiota on hepatic cancer progression and metastasis.
Usage of bioinformatics tools in unveiling mysteries in the gut-liver axis.
Utilization of in vitro models like organoids to understand and characterize the gut–liver axis.

Please note manuscripts consisting solely of bioinformatics or computational analysis of public genomic or transcriptomic databases that are not accompanied by validation (independent cohort or biological validation in vitro or in vivo) are out of the scope of this Research Topic.

Keywords: gut-liver association, tumor microenvironment, tumor microbiota, tumor gut

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.