Abstract:

Renal cell carcinoma is one of the most common malignancies in genitourinary cancers. In China, the incidence of renal cell carcinoma has been increasing year by year. Regulated cell death is a cell-independent and orderly death controlled by genes, which is ubiquitous in organisms and plays a crucial role in maintaining the cell homeostasis. Recently, cuproptosis was reported in Science, which further reinforced the importance of cell death in living organisms. With the increasing understanding of regulated cell death, more and more studies have shown that regulated cell death (such as ferroptosis, autophagy, pyroptosis) is closely related to the tumorigenesis and development of renal cell carcinoma. For example, induction of ferroptosis inhibits the invasion and metastasis of renal cell carcinoma and is closely related with better prognosis; pyroptosis not only induce renal cancer cell death and also activate the immune-response against renal cancer; autophagy plays a "bidirectional" role in renal cell carcinoma, which can inhibit the growth of renal cell carcinoma cells but may weaken the efficacy of combinational therapy; inhibition of apoptosis and necrotizing apoptosis can significantly promote the proliferation and invasion of renal cell carcinoma. This review has summarized the molecular mechanisms of ferroptosis, pyroptosis, autophagy, apoptosis and necrotizing apoptosis and the advances of different regulatory cell death in the tumorigenesis and development of renal cell carcinoma to provide a new perspective for exploring the mechanisms of tumorigenesis and potential targets of treatment.

Key words: Renal cell carcinoma, Cuproptosis, Ferroptosis, Autophagy, Pyroptosis, Necroptosis, Apoptosis