Autophagy is an important cellular repair mechanism, aiming at sequestering misfolded and dysfunctional proteins and damaged cell organelles. Dysfunctions in the autophagy process have been linked to several diseases, like infectious and neurodegenerative diseases, type II diabetes mellitus and cancer. Living organisms are constantly subjected to some degree of oxidative stress, mainly induced by reactive oxygen and nitrogen species. It has been shown that autophagy is readily induced by reactive oxygen species (ROS) upon nutrient deprivation. In recent years, research has increasingly focused on outlining novel therapeutic targets related to the autophagy process. With this review of the literature, we want to give an overview about the link between autophagy, oxidative stress and carcinogenesis.

Cigarette smoking is reported in about one third of adults worldwide. A strong relationship between cigarette smoke exposure and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) as well as lung cancer has been proven. However, about 15% of lung cancer cases, and between one fourth and one third of COPD cases, occur in never-smokers. The effects of cigarette smoke on the innate as well as the adaptive immune system have been widely investigated. It is assumed that certain immunologic features contribute to lung cancer and COPD development in the absence of smoking as the major risk factor. In this article, we review different immunological aspects of lung cancer and COPD with a special focus on non-smoking related risk factors.

Tumorigenesis is largely influenced by accompanying inflammation. Myeloid cells account for a significant proportion of pro-inflammatory cells within the tumor microenvironment. All steps of tumor formation and progression, such as the suppression of adaptive immune response, angio- and lymphangiogenesis, and the remodeling of the tumor stroma, are to some degree influenced by tumor-associated immune cells. Tumor-associated neutrophils (TANs), together with tumor-associated macrophages and myeloid-derived suppressor cells, count among tumor-associated myeloid cells. Still, the exact molecular mechanisms underlying the tumorigenic effects of TANs have not been investigated in detail. With this review of the literature, we aim to give an overview of the current data on TANs, with a special focus on lung cancer.

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) serves as risk factor for the development of lung cancer and seems to have a prognostic impact after surgery for non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). The aim was to investigate the impact of COPD and postoperative mucostasis on the long-term survival after resected NSCLC. We retrospectively reviewed the data from 342 patients with curatively resected NSCLC. The prognostic long-term impact of COPD and postoperative mucostasis on overall survival (OS), recurrence free survival (RFS) and cancer specific survival (CSS) was calculated using univariable and multivariable Cox regression analyses. We found that 52.3% suffered from COPD and 25.4% had postoperative mucostasis. COPD was significantly more common among smokers (59.9%) compared with non-smokers (21.3%), (p < 0.001). There was a significant relationship between COPD and postoperative mucostasis (p = 0.006) and between smoking and mucostasis (p = 0.023). Patients with postoperative mucostasis had a significantly worse OS (p < 0.001), RFS (p = 0.009) and CSS (p = 0.008). The present analysis demonstrated that postoperative mucostasis, but not COPD, was associated with both worse short- and long-term outcomes for OS, RFS and CSS in curatively resected NSCLC.

the Research Topic Comparison of lung cancer and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease in smokers and never-smokersTo the memory of Dr. Jerzy Szkudlarek, my best friend, who died of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Piotr Kus ́nierczyk Tobacco smoking was invented by Native Americans; archaeological evidence dates it to at least 2 300 years ago (1). However, smoking was not an everyday activity in these societies, as tobacco consumption, i.e. pipe smoking, was sacred, and smoking was limited to religious and social ceremonies (1). Many myths are associated with the origin of tobacco and smoking practices (1, 2). Unfortunately, at present, Native Americans are the population with the highest cigarette smoking rate among all ethnic groups in the United States of America, and the only one still growing, albeit slowly and nonsignificantly, in spite of efforts to promote smoking cessation (3).When America was "discovered" by Europeans, tobacco seeds and the custom of its smoking was imported to the Old Continent. Smoking lost its religious meaning and became an everyday custom leading to addiction, first mostly in men, but within the last 100 years increasingly so in women, particularly in less developed countries. In the years 1950-1952 it was noticed and described that lung cancer is associated with cigarette smoking (4-6). Since then, multiple publications confirming this observation and examining its different aspects have appeared: a PubMed search (Oct 14, 2022, "tobacco smoking and lung cancer") returns 1,096 results. As the numbers of never-smokers, as well as those having quit smoking increases, particularly in developed countries, the interest in the causes of lung cancer in never-smokers and former smokers is on the rise, and the number of publications on this topic is currently increasing (7), reaching 195 results in a PubMed search for "lung cancer never-smokers".