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Role of Inflammation in Cancer

A special issue of Cancers (ISSN 2072-6694).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 August 2026 | Viewed by 1038

Special Issue Editor


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Guest Editor
Department of Internal Medicine, Brody School of Medicine, East Carolina University, Greenville, NC, USA
Interests: cancer biology; inflammation; tumor microenvironment; acidosis; receptor signaling; GPCRs; targeted therapy; immunotherapy
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Inflammation is a hallmark of cancer. Chronic inflammation is associated with the development of various cancers. For example, chronic inflammation in the intestine (e.g., inflammatory bowel disease), stomach (e.g., Helicobacter pylori-induced gastritis) and liver (e.g., virus-induced hepatitis and steatohepatitis) is closely linked to the development of cancer in these organs. Moreover, obesity-related chronic inflammation increases the risk of developing numerous types of cancer. In the inflamed milieu, inflammatory cells generate cytokines, reactive oxygen/nitrogen species and pro-angiogenic factors that can induce DNA damage, gene mutations and promote cell proliferation and angiogenesis. Modulation of inflammation has been explored as a potential approach for cancer chemoprevention.   

Immune cell infiltration is a common feature of solid tumors. The infiltrated tumor immune cells may have pro-inflammatory or anti-inflammatory functions. Recent development of immunotherapy, such as immune checkpoint inhibitors and immune cell therapies, has changed the paradigm of cancer treatment and improved survival in a subset of cancer patients. However, immunotherapy may also cause a broad spectrum of inflammatory and autoimmune side effects (e.g., dermatitis, pneumonitis, colitis and thyroiditis), known as immune-related adverse events. New strategies are needed to enhance the efficacy of cancer immunotherapy and reduce inflammatory and autoimmune side effects.  

This Special Issue will cover research topics on inflammation and cancer, as indicated by, but not limited to, the keywords below. Original research papers, reviews, systematic review and commentary are all welcome.

You may choose our Joint Special Issue in Current Oncology.

Prof. Dr. Li Yang
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

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Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Cancers is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2900 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • cancer
  • inflammation
  • immune cells
  • cytokines
  • anti-inflammatory
  • tumor microenvironment
  • immunotherapy
  • immune-related adverse events
  • targeted therapy
  • chemotherapy and chemoprevention

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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Review

13 pages, 637 KB  
Review
Regional Anesthesia and the Perioperative Inflammatory Window in Cancer Surgery: From Surgical Stress to Immunometabolic Reprogramming
by Tomasz Reysner and Malgorzata Reysner
Cancers 2026, 18(7), 1158; https://doi.org/10.3390/cancers18071158 - 3 Apr 2026
Viewed by 738
Abstract
The impact of anesthetic technique on long-term oncologic outcomes remains controversial. While early observational data suggested that regional anesthesia might reduce cancer recurrence, large randomized trials have failed to demonstrate consistent survival benefits. This apparent contradiction may not reflect biological neutrality, but rather [...] Read more.
The impact of anesthetic technique on long-term oncologic outcomes remains controversial. While early observational data suggested that regional anesthesia might reduce cancer recurrence, large randomized trials have failed to demonstrate consistent survival benefits. This apparent contradiction may not reflect biological neutrality, but rather a mismatch between trial design and the inflammatory biology of the perioperative period. Surgical resection provokes an acute and intense inflammatory surge characterized by sympathetic activation, cytokine release, neutrophil extracellular trap formation, endothelial activation, and transient suppression of cellular immunity. During this perioperative inflammatory window, circulating tumor cells encounter a biologically permissive microenvironment that may facilitate immune evasion, adhesion, and early metastatic niche establishment. The magnitude of this inflammatory response varies across patients and may represent a critical, yet under-recognized, determinant of tumor–host dynamics. Anesthetic and analgesic strategies influence this inflammatory cascade. By attenuating nociceptive signaling and sympathetic activation, regional anesthesia may modulate perioperative immune and immunometabolic pathways. However, it should not be framed as an anti-cancer therapy per se, but rather as a potential regulator of the transient inflammatory milieu that shapes early oncologic biology. We propose that prior neutral trials may reflect methodological misalignment, including heterogeneous tumor populations, absence of inflammatory stratification, and reliance on distant survival endpoints without mechanistic correlates. Future investigations should integrate perioperative immune phenotyping, inflammatory biomarkers, and tumor subtype stratification to determine whether modulation of acute surgical inflammation meaningfully alters early tumor–host interactions. Reconceptualizing the perioperative period as a biologically active inflammatory interface may refine the anesthesiologist’s role within perioperative oncology and open new avenues for precision-based perioperative modulation. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Role of Inflammation in Cancer)
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