Abstract

In recent years, remarkable progress was registered in the field of cancer research. Though, cancer still represents a major cause of death and cancer metastasis a problem seeking for urgent solutions as it is the main reason for therapeutic failure. Unfortunately, the most common chemotherapeutic agents are non-selective and can damage healthy tissues and cause side effects that affect dramatically the quality of life of the patients. Targeted therapy with molecules that act specifically at the tumour sites interacting with overexpressed cancer receptors is a very promising strategy for achieving the specific delivery of anticancer drugs, radioisotopes or imaging agents. This review aims to give an overview on different strategies for targeting cancer cell receptors localised either at the extracellular matrix or at the cell membrane. Molecules like antibodies, aptamers and peptides targeting the cell surface are presented with advantages and disadvantages, with emphasis on peptides. The most representative peptides are described, including cell penetrating peptides, homing and anticancer peptides with particular consideration on recent discoveries.

摘要

近年来，癌症研究领域取得了显着进展。尽管如此，癌症仍然是导致死亡的主要原因，癌症转移是寻求紧急解决方案的一个问题，因为它是治疗失败的主要原因。不幸的是，最常见的化学治疗剂是非选择性的，会损害健康组织并引起严重影响患者生活质量的副作用。使用特异性作用于与过表达癌症受体相互作用的肿瘤部位的分子进行靶向治疗是实现抗癌药物、放射性同位素或显像剂特异性递送的非常有前景的策略。本综述旨在概述靶向定位于细胞外基质或细胞膜的癌细胞受体的不同策略。针对细胞表面的抗体、适体和肽等分子具有优点和缺点，重点是肽。描述了最具代表性的肽，​​包括细胞穿透肽、归巢肽和抗癌肽，并特别考虑了最近的发现。