Germline Susceptibility and Somatic Genetic Alterations in Carcinogenesis
A special issue of Life (ISSN 2075-1729). This special issue belongs to the section "Physiology and Pathology".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 28 February 2026
Special Issue Editors
Interests: cancer biology; cancer genetics; environmental toxicology; thirdhand smoke; biomarker development; translational medicine
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Interests: computer; vision machine learning; image processing; bioinformatics; computational biology; imaging biomarkers
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Cancer arises from a complex interplay between inherited genetic predispositions and acquired somatic mutations. This Special Issue explores the dynamic relationship between germline susceptibility loci and somatic genetic alterations, emphasizing the role of their convergence in tumor initiation, progression, and response to therapy.
Advancements in next-generation sequencing and integrative genomics have unveiled novel germline variants that modulate cancer risk across diverse tissues and populations. At same time, systematic analyses of somatic mutation landscapes have deepened our understanding of cancer-specific drivers, mutational signatures, and clonal evolution.
This Issue brings together original research and reviews that examine
- The influence of germline variants on somatic mutation rates, spectra, and selection;
- Mechanistic insights into how germline-somatic interactions shape cancer phenotypes and vulnerabilities;
- The role of inherited predisposition in tissue-specific oncogenesis, including penetrance-modifying somatic events;
- The impact of host genetics on tumor immune microenvironment and therapy response;
- Methodological advances in detecting allele-specific expression, mosaicism, and germline-somatic interactions in large-scale cancer datasets.
By integrating constitutional and somatic genomics, this collection underscores the need for a holistic view of cancer genetics—one that informs risk prediction, early detection, precision therapy, and familial cancer management.
We hope this Special Issue stimulates further interdisciplinary research bridging cancer epidemiology, molecular genetics, and clinical oncology.
Dr. Jian-Hua Mao
Dr. Hang Chang
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
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Keywords
- gene mutation
- genetic susceptibility
- cancer genetics
- genome-wide association study
- multi-omics
- next generation sequencing
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