How do cancer cells overcome apoptosis?

In some cases, cancer cells may escape apoptosis by increasing or decreasing expression of anti- or pro-apoptotic genes, respectively. Alternatively, they may inhibit apoptosis by stabilizing or de-stabilizing anti- or pro-apoptotic proteins, respectively.

Can apoptosis be reversed?

Strikingly, the time-lapse live imaging and biochemical studies reported here reveal that apoptotic cells can survive and reverse the process of dying even after they have reached an advanced stage of apoptosis, including caspase-3 activation and even DNA damage.

Can you induce apoptosis in cancer cells?

Induction of apoptosis is one of the most important markers of cytotoxic antitumor agents. Some natural compounds including plants induce apoptotic pathways that are blocked in cancer cells through various mechanisms in cancer cells.

How do cancer cells escape death?

One thing we know about cancer cells: they can resist death. They evade apoptosis, the mechanism that programs cell death once cells become damaged. Normally, apoptosis helps keep an organism healthy through growth and development, maintaining body tissue by removing infected or damaged cells.

How do you reverse apoptosis?

Simply washing away apoptotic inducers is sufficient to allow the majority of dying cells to survive and most hallmarks of apoptosis to vanish, indicating that reversal of apoptosis is an endogenous cellular mechanism.

What triggers apoptosis?

Apoptosis can be triggered by mild cellular injury and by various factors internal or external to the cell; the damaged cells are then disposed of in an orderly fashion. As a morphologically distinct form of programmed cell death, apoptosis is different from the other major process of cell death known as necrosis.

Can you control apoptosis?

There are many ways in which cancer cells which evade apoptosis: caspase function can be inhibited or the trigger for apoptosis can be disabled [3]. The upregulation of antiapoptotic BCL-2 proteins and loss of BAX and/or BAK are the predominant methods of evasion.

Can apoptosis prevent cancer?

The prevention of cancer is one of the main functions of apoptosis [3]. Typically, it is the intrinsic pathway that is inhibited in cancer, however, there are a wide range of means to inhibit apoptosis.

Can cell damage be reversed?

Cell injury is classified as reversible if the injured cell can regain homeostasis and return to a morphologically (and functionally) normal state. Acute cell swelling is the classic morphologic change in reversible injury; however, it is also the typical early change of irreversible cell injury.