Liver cancer is the third greatest cause of cancer-related mortality, which of the major pathological type is hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) accounting for more than 90%. HCC is characterized by high mortality and is predisposed to metastasis and relapse, leading to a low five-year survival rate and poor clinical prognosis. Numerous crosstalk among tumor parenchymal cells, anti-tumor cells, stroma cells, and immunosuppressive cells contributes to the immunosuppressive tumor microenvironment (TME), in which the function and frequency of anti-tumor cells are reduced with that of associated pro-tumor cells increasing, accordingly resulting in tumor malignant progression. Indeed, sorting out and understanding the signaling pathways and molecular mechanisms of cellular crosstalk in TME is crucial to discover more key targets and specific biomarkers, so that develop more efficient methods for early diagnosis and individualized treatment of liver cancer. This piece of writing offers insight into the recent advances in HCC-TME and reviews various mechanisms that promote HCC malignant progression from the perspective of mutual crosstalk among different types of cells in TME, aiming to assist in identifying the possible research directions and methods in the future for discovering new targets that could prevent HCC malignant progression.

中文翻译：

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促进 HCC 的关键驱动因素：肿瘤微环境中的细胞串扰


肝癌是癌症相关死亡的第三大原因，其主要病理类型是肝细胞癌（HCC），占90%以上。 HCC具有死亡率高、易转移、易复发等特点，导致五年生存率低、临床预后差。肿瘤实质细胞、抗肿瘤细胞、基质细胞和免疫抑制细胞之间的大量串扰导致了免疫抑制肿瘤微环境（TME），其中抗肿瘤细胞的功能和频率降低，而相关的促肿瘤细胞的功能和频率增加，从而导致肿瘤恶性进展。事实上，梳理和理解TME中细胞串扰的信号通路和分子机制对于发现更多关键靶点和特异性生物标志物，从而开发更有效的肝癌早期诊断和个体化治疗方法至关重要。本文深入剖析了HCC-TME的最新进展，并从TME中不同类型细胞之间相互串扰的角度回顾了促进HCC恶性进展的各种机制，旨在帮助确定该领域可能的研究方向和方法。发现可以预防 HCC 恶性进展的新靶点的未来。