Introduction: Cancer is considered the second leading cause of death worldwide despite the progress made in early detection and advances in classical therapies. Advancing in the fight against cancer requires the development of novel strategies, and the suicide gene transfer to tumor cells is providing new possibilities for cancer therapy.
Areas covered: In this manuscript, authors present an overview of suicide gene systems and the latest innovations done to enhance cancer suicide gene therapy strategies by i) improving vectors for targeted gene delivery using tissue specific promoter and receptors; ii) modification of the tropism; and iii) combining suicide genes and/or classical therapies for cancer. Finally, the authors highlight the main challenges to be addressed in the future.
Expert opinion: Even if many efforts are needed for suicide gene therapy to be a real alternative for cancer treatment, we believe that the significant progress made in the knowledge of cancer biology and characterization of cancer stem cells accompanied by the development of novel targeted vectors will enhance the effectiveness of this type of therapeutic strategy. Moreover, combined with current treatments, suicide gene therapy will improve the clinical outcome of patients with cancer in the future.
Keywords: Cancer; cancer stem cells; suicide gene therapy; targeted vectors; tissue specific promoter.