Natural Bacterial and Fungal Peptides as a Promising Treatment to Defeat Lung Cancer Cells

Abstract

Despite the increasing availability of modern treatments, including personalized therapies, there is a strong need to search for new drugs that will be effective in the fight against cancer. The chemotherapeutics currently available to oncologists do not always yield satisfactory outcomes when used in systemic treatments, and patients experience burdensome side effects during their application. In the era of personalized therapies, doctors caring for non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients have been given a powerful weapon, namely molecularly targeted therapies and immunotherapies. They can be used when genetic variants of the disease qualifying for therapy are diagnosed. These therapies have contributed to the extension of the overall survival time in patients. Nevertheless, effective treatment may be hindered in the case of clonal selection of tumor cells with acquired resistance mutations. The state-of-the-art therapy currently used in NSCLC patients is immunotherapy targeting the immune checkpoints. Although it is effective, some patients have been observed to develop resistance to immunotherapy, but its cause is still unknown. Personalized therapies extend the lifespan and time to cancer progression in patients, but only those with a confirmed marker qualifying for the treatment (gene mutations/rearrangements or PD-L1 expression on tumor cells) can benefit from these therapies. They also cause less burdensome side effects than chemotherapy. The article is focused on compounds that can be used in oncology and produce as few side effects as possible. The search for compounds of natural origin, e.g., plants, bacteria, or fungi, exhibiting anticancer properties seems to be a good solution. This article is a literature review of research on compounds of natural origin that can potentially be used as part of NSCLC therapies.

A Novel Anticancer Peptide Derived from Bryopsis plumosa Regulates Proliferation and Invasion in Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer Cells

“…Moreover, the high hydrophobicity of these peptides favors their penetration into the lipid bilayer of the cell membrane. Additionally, a previous report indicated increased cytotoxicity of tryptophan (W) residue-containing peptides against A549 cells; this result is comparable to our findings that demonstrate three tryptophan amino acid residues in the MP06 peptide [32,33]. Although we showed the anticancer activity of MP06 in NSCLC, further studies using its modified and truncated version can optimize the anticancer effect of this ACP.…”

Gut microbes as medical signature for the effectiveness of immunotherapy in patients with advanced non‐small cell lung cancer

“…The phylum Ascomycota topped in responders and non‐responders, followed by Firmicutes , Basidiomycota , Chytridiomycota , Microsporidia , Mucoromycota , Candida , Malassezia , and Neosartorya . In addition, Aspergillus terreus and Verticillium longisporum and Aspergillus homomorphous and Lachancea mirantina exhibited the greatest positive relationships among respondents, while the strongest inverse relationships were observed between Enterocytozoon bieneusi and Debaryomyces hansenii and Debaryomyces hansenii , Lachancea mirantina , and Schizosaccharomyces octosporus 38–41 …”

“…In addition, Aspergillus terreus and Verticillium longisporum and Aspergillus homomorphous and Lachancea mirantina exhibited the greatest positive relationships among respondents, while the strongest inverse relationships were observed between Enterocytozoon bieneusi and Debaryomyces hansenii and Debaryomyces hansenii , Lachancea mirantina , and Schizosaccharomyces octosporus . 38 , 39 , 40 , 41 …”