Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2015 Jun;36 Suppl 1(Suppl 1):S89-110.
doi: 10.1093/carcin/bgv032.

Disruptive environmental chemicals and cellular mechanisms that confer resistance to cell death

Affiliations
Review

Disruptive environmental chemicals and cellular mechanisms that confer resistance to cell death

Kannan Badri Narayanan et al. Carcinogenesis. 2015 Jun.

Abstract

Cell death is a process of dying within biological cells that are ceasing to function. This process is essential in regulating organism development, tissue homeostasis, and to eliminate cells in the body that are irreparably damaged. In general, dysfunction in normal cellular death is tightly linked to cancer progression. Specifically, the up-regulation of pro-survival factors, including oncogenic factors and antiapoptotic signaling pathways, and the down-regulation of pro-apoptotic factors, including tumor suppressive factors, confers resistance to cell death in tumor cells, which supports the emergence of a fully immortalized cellular phenotype. This review considers the potential relevance of ubiquitous environmental chemical exposures that have been shown to disrupt key pathways and mechanisms associated with this sort of dysfunction. Specifically, bisphenol A, chlorothalonil, dibutyl phthalate, dichlorvos, lindane, linuron, methoxychlor and oxyfluorfen are discussed as prototypical chemical disruptors; as their effects relate to resistance to cell death, as constituents within environmental mixtures and as potential contributors to environmental carcinogenesis.

PubMed Disclaimer

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Apoptotic and non-apoptotic signaling pathways and the involvement of anthropogenic chemicals.

References

    1. Nicholson D.W., et al. (2003) Apoptosis. Life and death decisions. Science, 299, 214–215. - PubMed
    1. Fridman J.S., et al. (2003) Control of apoptosis by p53. Oncogene, 22, 9030–9040. - PubMed
    1. Shortt J., et al. (2012) Oncogenes in cell survival and cell death. Cold Spring Harb. Perspect. Biol., 4. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Orr B., et al. (2013) A double-edged sword: how oncogenes and tumor suppressor genes can contribute to chromosomal instability. Front. Oncol., 3, 164. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Croce C.M. (2008) Oncogenes and cancer. N. Engl. J. Med., 358, 502–511. - PubMed

Publication types

MeSH terms

Substances