Current status of nucleic acid therapy and its new progress in cancer treatment

• Published in: International immunopharmacology Vol. 142; no. Pt B; p. 113157
• Main Authors: Lou, Wenting, Zhang, Leqi, Wang, Jianwei
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Netherlands Elsevier B.V 05.12.2024
• Subjects: Antisense oligonucleotides; Cancer treatment; miRNA; mRNA vaccines; Nucleic acid therapy; siRNA; mRNA vaccines; Antisense oligonucleotides; miRNA; siRNA; Nucleic acid therapy; Cancer treatment
• ISSN: 1567-5769; 1878-1705; 1878-1705
• DOI: 10.1016/j.intimp.2024.113157

•Nucleic acid drugs are emerging therapeutic drugs that function at the gene level.•We list the different types of RNA therapeutic drugs and their development history.•Nucleic acid therapy has broad application prospects, especially playing a crucial role in cancer treatment.•We focused on the current status and breakthrough progress of nucleic acid drugs for cancer treatment in recent years. Nucleic acid is an essential biopolymer in all living cells, performing the functions of storing and transmitting genetic information and synthesizing protein. In recent decades, with the progress of science and biotechnology and the continuous exploration of the functions performed by nucleic acid, more and more studies have confirmed that nucleic acid therapy for living organisms has great medical therapeutic potential. Nucleic acid drugs began to become independent therapeutic agents. As a new therapeutic method, nucleic acid therapy plays an important role in the treatment of genetic diseases, viral infections and cancers. There are currently 19 nucleic acid drugs approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). In the following review, we start from principles and advantages of nucleic acid therapy, and briefly describe development history of nucleic acid drugs. And then we give examples of various RNA therapeutic drugs, including antisense oligonucleotides (ASO), mRNA vaccines, small interfering RNA (siRNA) and microRNA (miRNA), aptamers, and small activating RNA (saRNA). In addition, we also focused on the current status of nucleic acid drugs used in cancer therapy and the breakthrough in recent years. Clinical trials of nucleic acid drugs for cancer treatment are under way, conventional radiotherapy and chemotherapy combined with the immunotherapies such as checkpoint inhibitors and nucleic acid drugs may be the main prospects for successful cancer treatment.