Inflammatory immune responses in tumor microenvironment and metastasis of hepatocellular carcinoma

Metastasis is a multistage process that requires cancer cells to escape from the primary tumor, survive in the circulation, seed at distant sites and grow. Each of these processes involves rate-limiting steps that are influenced by non-malignant cells of the tumor microenvironment. There are growing evidences that tumors are sustained and promoted by inflammatory signals from the surrounding microenvironment. This review describes experimental data demonstrating the role of the inflammatory immune responses of microenvironment in metastases of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), points out the prospective areas for future research and possible new therapeutic approaches to control the metastasis of HCC.