Targeting autophagy in colorectal cancer: An update on pharmacological small-molecule compounds

作者：Li, Zixiang; Si, Wen; Jin, Wenke; Yuan, Zhaoxin; Chen, Yi^*; Fu, Leilei^*

来源：Drug Discovery Today, 2022, 27(8): 2373-2385.

DOI：10.1016/j.drudis.2022.05.011

• Autophagy
• Colorectal cancer
• Small-molecule compound
• Cytoprotective autophagy
• Autophagy-associated
• cell death

Autophagy, an evolutionarily highly conserved cellular degradation process, plays the Janus role (either cytoprotective or death-promoting) in colorectal cancer, so the targeting of several key autophagic pathways with small-molecule compounds may be a new therapeutic strategy. In this review, we discuss autophagy-associated cell death pathways and key cytoprotective autophagy pathways in colorectal cancer. Moreover, we summarize a series of small-molecule compounds that have the potential to modulate autophagy-associated cell death or cytoprotective autophagy for therapeutic purposes. Taken together, these findings demonstrate the Janus role of autophagy in colorectal cancer, and shed new light on the exploitation of a growing number of small-molecule compounds to target autophagy in future cancer drug discovery.

• 单位
  四川大学; 中国科学院; 西南交通大学; y