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Copyright ©The Author(s) 2022. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastrointest Oncol. Apr 15, 2022; 14(4): 794-807
Published online Apr 15, 2022. doi: 10.4251/wjgo.v14.i4.794
Role of sirtuins in esophageal cancer: Current status and future prospects
Ryota Otsuka, Koichi Hayano, Hisahiro Matsubara
Ryota Otsuka, Koichi Hayano, Hisahiro Matsubara, Department of Frontier Surgery, Graduate School of Medicine, Chiba University, Chiba 260-8670, Japan
Author contributions: Otsuka R contributed to conception and design; All authors contributed to manuscript writing, figure preparation and review and approval of the article to be published.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (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: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Koichi Hayano, FACS, MD, PhD, Associate Professor, Department of Frontier Surgery, Graduate School of Medicine, Chiba University, 1-8-1, Inohana, Chuo-ku, Chiba 260-8670, Japan. hayatin1973@gmail.com
Received: December 17, 2021
Peer-review started: December 17, 2021
First decision: January 27, 2022
Revised: February 2, 2022
Accepted: March 17, 2022
Article in press: March 17, 2022
Published online: April 15, 2022
Processing time: 119 Days and 1.5 Hours
Abstract

Esophageal cancer (EC) is a malignant cancer that still has a poor prognosis, although its prognosis has been improving with the development of multidisciplinary treatment modalities such as surgery, chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Therefore, identifying specific molecular markers that can be served as biomarkers for the prognosis and treatment response of EC is highly desirable to aid in the personalization and improvement of the precision of medical treatment. Sirtuins are a family of nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD+)-dependent proteins consisting of seven members (SIRT1-7). These proteins have been reported to be involved in the regulation of a variety of biological functions including apoptosis, metabolism, stress response, senescence, differentiation and cell cycle progression. Given the variety of functions of sirtuins, they are speculated to be associated in some manner with cancer progression. However, while the role of sirtuins in cancer progression has been investigated over the past few years, their precise role remains difficult to characterize, as they have both cancer-promoting and cancer-suppressing properties, depending on the type of cancer. These conflicting characteristics make research into the nature of sirtuins all the more fascinating. However, the role of sirtuins in EC remains unclear due to the limited number of reports concerning sirtuins in EC. We herein review the current findings and future prospects of sirtuins in EC.

Keywords: Esophageal cancer; Sirtuin; Esophageal squamous cell carcinoma; Esophageal adenocarcinoma; Biomarker; Treatment

Core Tip: Although there have been several reports on the function of sirtuins in cancer progression, the biological roles and clinical implications of sirtuins in esophageal cancer (EC) remain controversial. This is the first review to focus on sirtuins in the field of EC. In this review, we will briefly summarize the role of sirtuins in cancer and discuss the current findings and future prospects of sirtuins in EC.