Extrachromosomal circular DNA in cancer drug resistance and its potential clinical implications

Juanjuan Luo; Ying Li; Tangxuan Zhang; Tianhan Xv; Chao Chen; Mengting Li; Qixiang Qiu; Yusheng Song; Shaogui Wan

doi:10.3389/fonc.2022.1092705

Extrachromosomal circular DNA in cancer drug resistance and its potential clinical implications

Front Oncol. 2023 Jan 30:12:1092705. doi: 10.3389/fonc.2022.1092705. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Juanjuan Luo^{1

2}, Ying Li¹, Tangxuan Zhang¹, Tianhan Xv¹, Chao Chen³, Mengting Li¹, Qixiang Qiu¹, Yusheng Song³, Shaogui Wan^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Center for Molecular Pathology, Department of Basic Medicine, Gannan Medical University, Ganzhou, China.
² China Medical University, Shenyang, China, Ganzhou, China.
³ Department of Interventional Radiology, The People's Hospital of Ganzhou City, Ganzhou, China.

Abstract

Chemotherapy is widely used to treat patients with cancer. However, resistance to chemotherapeutic drugs remains a major clinical concern. The mechanisms of cancer drug resistance are extremely complex and involve such factors such as genomic instability, DNA repair, and chromothripsis. A recently emerging area of interest is extrachromosomal circular DNA (eccDNA), which forms owing to genomic instability and chromothripsis. eccDNA exists widely in physiologically healthy individuals but also arises during tumorigenesis and/or treatment as a drug resistance mechanism. In this review, we summarize the recent progress in research regarding the role of eccDNA in the development of cancer drug resistance as well as the mechanisms thereof. Furthermore, we discuss the clinical applications of eccDNA and propose some novel strategies for characterizing drug-resistant biomarkers and developing potential targeted cancer therapies.

Keywords: cancer genetics; chromothripsis; drug resistance; extrachromosomal circular DNA; genomic instability.

Publication types

Review

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant no. 82060524), the Youth Jinggang Scholars Program in Jiangxi Province, the Provincial Program of Gannan Medical University (YC2022-S965), and the National College Student’s Innovation Entrepreneurial Training Plan Program (202210413018).