Background: Cancer is a wide range cellular level disease that occurs when cells go through uncontrolled division and growth. The mechanisms by which the cells undergo metastasis are complex and involve many interactions between the tumor cells and their cellular environment. Matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) have been found to over-express at various stages of tumor progression and their inhibition using MMP inhibitors has been a subject of potential therapy against cancer.

Objective: This review discusses recent research in MMP inhibitors (MMPI) used for preventing tumor progression.

Methods: In this review, we explored the role of MMPs in cancer progression and summarized the current developments in MMPIs, their role in cancer suppression in in vitro and in vivo studies and their evaluation in clinical trials from the current research data.

Results: MMPIs have shown to be very successful in in vitro models, cell lines and in some in vivo studies. Unfortunately, their efficacy in clinical trials has been found to be hit and miss. Recent studies have shown that the novel delivery approaches of MMP inhibitors may enhance their therapeutic effects towards the prevention of cancer.

Conclusion: In this review, we presented different MMP inhibitors, their performance at different stages of models - in vitro, in vivo, small animal models and eventually clinical trials. We provide newer methods of MMPI delivery that may be better targeted to suppress only specific MMPs and avoid toxic side effects in healthy cells.

背景：癌症是一种广泛的细胞水平疾病，当细胞经历不受控制的分裂和生长时就会发生。细胞发生转移的机制很复杂，涉及肿瘤细胞与其细胞环境之间的许多相互作用。已发现基质金属蛋白酶 (MMP) 在肿瘤进展的不同阶段过度表达，并且使用 MMP 抑制剂对其进行抑制已成为潜在的癌症治疗主题。

目的：本综述讨论了用于预防肿瘤进展的 MMP 抑制剂 (MMPI) 的最新研究。

方法：在这篇综述中，我们探讨了 MMPs 在癌症进展中的作用，并根据当前研究数据总结了 MMPIs 的最新进展、它们在体外和体内研究中在癌症抑制中的作用以及它们在临床试验中的评估。

结果： MMPI 已被证明在体外模型、细胞系和一些体内研究中非常成功。不幸的是，它们在临床试验中的功效被发现是偶然的。最近的研究表明，MMP 抑制剂的新型递送方法可能会增强其对预防癌症的治疗效果。

结论：在这篇综述中，我们介绍了不同的 MMP 抑制剂，它们在模型不同阶段的表现——体外、体内、小动物模型以及最终的临床试验。我们提供了更新的 MMPI 递送方法，可以更好地靶向抑制特定的 MMP 并避免对健康细胞产生毒副作用。