Relationship between p53 status and the bioeffect of ionizing radiation

Xiaohan Kong; Dehai Yu; Zhaoyi Wang; Sijie Li

doi:10.3892/ol.2021.12922

Relationship between p53 status and the bioeffect of ionizing radiation

Oncol Lett. 2021 Sep;22(3):661. doi: 10.3892/ol.2021.12922. Epub 2021 Jul 14.

Authors

Xiaohan Kong¹, Dehai Yu², Zhaoyi Wang³, Sijie Li¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Breast Surgery, The First Hospital of Jilin University, Changchun, Jilin 130021, P.R. China.
² Laboratory of Cancer Precision Medicine, The First Hospital of Jilin University, Changchun, Jilin 130061, P.R. China.
³ Department of Gastrointestinal Surgery, China-Japan Union Hospital of Jilin University, Changchun, Jilin 130033, P.R. China.

Abstract

Radiotherapy is widely used in the clinical treatment of cancer patients and it may be used alone or in combination with surgery or chemotherapy to inhibit tumor development. However, radiotherapy may at times not kill all cancer cells completely, as certain cells may develop radioresistance that counteracts the effects of radiation. The emergence of radioresistance is associated with the genetic background and epigenetic regulation of cells. p53 is an important tumor suppressor gene that is expressed at low levels in cells. However, when cells are subjected to stress-induced stimulation, the expression level of p53 increases, thereby preventing genomic disruption. This mechanism has important roles in maintaining cell stability and inhibiting carcinogenesis. However, mutation and deletion destroy the anticancer function of p53 and may induce carcinogenesis. In tumor radiotherapy, the status of p53 expression in cancer cells has a close relationship with radiotherapeutic efficacy. Therefore, understanding how p53 expression affects the cellular response to radiation is of great significance for solving the problem of radioresistance and improving radiotherapeutic outcomes. For the present review, the literature was searched for studies published between 1979 and 2021 using the PubMed database (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/) with the following key words: Wild-type p53, mutant-type p53, long non-coding RNA, microRNA, gene mutation, radioresistance and radiosensitivity. From the relevant studies retrieved, the association between different p53 mutants and cellular radiosensitivity, as well as the molecular mechanisms of p53 affecting the radiosensitivity of cells, were summarized. The aim of the present study was to provide useful information for understanding and resolving radioresistance, to help clinical researchers develop more accurate treatment strategies and to improve radiotherapeutic outcomes for cancer patients with p53 mutations.

Keywords: gene mutation; ionizing radiation; long non-coding RNA; microRNA; p53 gene; tumor.

Publication types

Review

Grants and funding

This work was supported in part by the Subject Arrangement Program from the Science and Technology Department of Jilin Province (grant nos. 20190201209JC to SL and 20200201123JC to DY).