review · International Journal of Medical Sciences
Oral cancer presents substantial diversity at clinical and histological levels. Within this disease, the PI3K/AKT/mTOR signalling pathway is one of the most commonly altered mechanisms, governing critical cellular and metabolic processes. Targeting proteins within this network provides a strategy for designing selective therapies that minimise off-target toxic effects. The pathway directly regulates autophagy and linked apoptotic responses, which play decisive roles during the progression and metastatic spread of oral squamous cell carcinoma. Furthermore, mapping the upstream activators and downstream effectors of this signalling cascade identifies distinct molecular points that can serve as prospective targets for treating oral malignancies.
Oral cancer is challenging to treat due to its biological variation. Pinpointing how specific signalling pathways control cell survival and death helps researchers design more selective treatments. Developing drugs directed at these precise molecular targets can help fight tumour progression and metastasis while reducing the toxic side effects typically experienced by patients receiving conventional therapies.
This research informs early-stage pharmaceutical discovery for oral squamous cell carcinoma therapeutics. Potential users include oncology drug developers and medicinal chemists seeking molecular targets to create selective inhibitors with minimal off-target effects. As the findings focus on pathway regulation and target identification, practical commercial applications remain at an early research stage, well prior to clinical translation.
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Oral cancer is the most heterogeneous cancer at clinical and histological levels. PI3K/AKT/mTOR pathway was identified as one of the most commonly modulated signals in oral cancer, which regulates major cellular and metabolic activity of the cell. Thus, various proteins of PI3K/AKT/mTOR pathway were used as therapeutic targets for oral cancer, to design more specific drugs with less off-target toxicity. This review sheds light on the regulation of PI3K/AKT/mTOR, and its role in controlling autophagy and associated apoptosis during the progression and metastasis of oral squamous type of malignancy (OSCC). In addition, we reviewed in detail the upstream activators and the downstream effectors of PI3K/AKT/mTOR signaling as potential therapeutic targets for oral cancer treatment.
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DOI: 10.7150/ijms.94566
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