Androgen receptor functions as transcriptional repressor of cancer-associated fibroblast activation
Summary
Sex hormones control normal development and are involved in different cancer types. Androgen signaling is mainly investigated in the context of prostate cancer and little is known about its role in skin malignancies. In this article, authors have pointed out the role of androgen receptor (AR) in the stromal compartment of three major skin cancer types being squamous cell carcinomas (SCCs), basal cell carcinomas, and melanomas. They show that AR signaling is essential to the normal functioning of dermal fibroblasts. AR loss, as showed in their study, increases the conversion of normal dermal fibroblasts to cancer associated fibroblasts (CAFs), that are able to enhance the tumorigenicity of squamous cell carcinoma (CSS) cells and melanoma cells in a mouse model of skin cancer. Their findings suggest AR as a potential and interesting target for the development of stroma-focused therapies against skin cancers.
