生态学
生物扩散
进化生态学
癌症
共同进化
生物
进化生物学
人口
医学
遗传学
环境卫生
寄主(生物学)
出处
期刊:Theranostics
[Ivyspring International Publisher]
日期:2023-01-01
卷期号:13 (5): 1607-1631
被引量:72
摘要
Nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) is a particular entity of head neck cancer that is generally regarded as a genetic disease with diverse intertumor and intratumor heterogeneity.This perspective review mainly outlines the up-to-date knowledge of cancer ecology and NPC progression, and presents a number of conceptual stepping-stones.At the beginning, I explicitly advocate that the nature of NPC (cancer) is not a genetic disease but an ecological disease: a multidimensional spatiotemporal "unity of ecology and evolution" pathological ecosystem.The hallmarks of cancer is proposed to act as ecological factors of population fitness.Subsequently, NPC cells are described as invasive species and its metastasis as a multidirectional ecological dispersal.The foundational ecological principles include intraspecific relationship (e.g.communication) and interspecific relationship (e.g.competition, predation, parasitism and mutualism) are interpreted to understand NPC progression."Mulberry-fish-ponds" model can well illustrate the dynamic reciprocity of cancer ecosystem.Tumor-host interface is the ecological transition zone of cancer, and tumor buddings should be recognized as ecological islands separated from the mainland.It should be noted that tumor-host interface has a significantly molecular and functional edge effect because of its curvature and irregularity.Selection driving factors and ecological therapy including hyperthermia for NPC patients, and future perspectives in such field as "ecological pathology", "multidimensional tumoriecology" are also discussed.I advance that "nothing in cancer evolution or ecology makes sense except in the light of the other".The cancer ecology tree is constructed to comprehensively point out the future research direction.Taken together, the establishment of NPC ecology theory and cancer ecology tree might provide a novel conceptual framework and paradigm for our understanding of cancer complex causal process and potential preventive and therapeutic applications for patients.
科研通智能强力驱动
Strongly Powered by AbleSci AI