Commensal bacteria modulate the tumor microenvironment. Issue 1 (28th September 2016) - Poutahidis, Theofilos
Highlights: Data reveal that the milieu of immune cells and factors in the whole host environment determine the fate of dysplastic and preneoplastic lesions toward carcinogenesis or regression. Clinically silent gastrointestinal tract immune networks and commensal microbiota may impart healthful phenotypes or alternatively stimulate distant smoldering carcinogenic processes in the mammary and prostate glands. Microbes may thus be determining the fate of the distal cancer microenvironment. Taken together, these results suggest that exposures to bacteria may be used therapeutically for epigenetic control of resident immune cell populations combating cancer. Abstract: It has been recently shown that gut microbes modulate whole host immune and hormonal factors impacting the fate of distant preneoplastic lesions toward malignancy or regression. This raises the possibility that the tumor microenvironment interacts with broader systemic microbial-immune networks. These accumulated findings suggest novel therapeutic opportunities for holobiont engineering in emerging tumor microenvironments.