Molecular Cancer (Mar 2021)

The role of mRNA in the development, diagnosis, treatment and prognosis of neural tumors

  • Yiyang Zheng,
  • Yanyan Luo,
  • Xixi Chen,
  • Huiting Li,
  • Baojun Huang,
  • Baofeng Zhou,
  • Liqing Zhu,
  • Xianhui Kang,
  • Wujun Geng

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1186/s12943-021-01341-7
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 20, no. 1
pp. 1 – 16

Abstract

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Abstract Neural tumors can generally be divided into central nervous system tumors and peripheral nervous tumors. Because this type of tumor is located in the nerve, even benign tumors are often difficult to remove by surgery. In addition, the majority of neural tumors are malignant, and it is particular the same for the central nervous system tumors. Even treated with the means such as chemotherapy and radiotherapy, they are also difficult to completely cure. In recent years, an increasingly number of studies have focused on the use of mRNA to treat tumors, representing an emerging gene therapy. The use of mRNA can use the expression of some functional proteins for the treatment of genetic disorders or tissue repair, and it can also be applied to immunotherapy through the expression of antigens, antibodies or receptors. Therefore, although these therapies are not fully-fledged enough, they have a broad research prospect. In addition, there are many ways to treat tumors using mRNA vaccines and exosomes carrying mRNA, which have drawn much attention. In this study, we reviewed the current research on the role of mRNA in the development, diagnosis, treatment and prognosis of neural tumors, and examine the future research prospects of mRNA in neural tumors and the opportunities and challenges that will arise in the future application of clinical treatment.

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