Editorial
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2016. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Feb 21, 2016; 22(7): 2159-2164
Published online Feb 21, 2016. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v22.i7.2159
Pharmacological cyclin dependent kinase inhibitors: Implications for colorectal cancer
Archana Balakrishnan, Arpita Vyas, Kaivalya Deshpande, Dinesh Vyas
Archana Balakrishnan, Arpita Vyas, Kaivalya Deshpande, College of Human Medicine, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, United States
Dinesh Vyas, Texas Tech University at the Permian Basin, Odessa, TX 79707, United States
Author contributions: Balakrishnan A and Vyas D collected the material; Balakrishnan A wrote the manuscript with the supervision of Vyas D; Deshpande K and Vyas A contributed equally to the research; all authors approved the manuscript.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors declare no financial conflict of interest
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Dinesh Vyas, MD, MS, FACS, MD, MS, FACS, Associate Professor, Associate Dean Surgery Research, Associate Program Director Surgery Residency, Texas Tech University at the Permian Basin, Odessa, TX 79707, United States. dineshvyas@yahoo.com
Telephone: +1-432-7035290 Fax: +1-432-7035290
Received: August 21, 2015
Peer-review started: August 21, 2015
First decision: October 14, 2015
Revised: December 4, 2015
Accepted: December 30, 2015
Article in press: December 30, 2015
Published online: February 21, 2016
Processing time: 163 Days and 9.4 Hours
Abstract

Colorectal cancer accounts for a significant proportion of cancer deaths worldwide. The need to develop more chemotherapeutic agents to combat this disease is critical. Cyclin dependent kinases (CDKs), along with its binding partner cyclins, serve to control the growth of cells through the cell cycle. A new class of drugs, termed CDK inhibitors, has been studied in preclinical and now clinical trials. These inhibitors are believed to act as an anti-cancer drug by blocking CDKs to block the uncontrolled cellular proliferation that is hallmark of cancers like colorectal cancer. CDK article provides overview of the emerging drug class of CDK inhibitors and provides a list of ones that are currently in clinical trials.

Keywords: Colorectal cancer; Cyclin; Cyclin dependent kinase inhibitor

Core tip: This article provides a brief overview of an emerging drug class, cyclin-dependent kinases inhibitors and their potential implications in colorectal cancer treatment.