Alkaliptosis: a new weapon for cancer therapy

Malignant tumors are one of the major causes of death worldwide, and the development of better treatments is urgently needed. There are many types of cancer treatment, such as surgery, chemotherapy, radiation therapy, immunotherapy, and targeted therapy, that might improve patient outcomes in a genotype- and stage-dependent manner. The main goal of cancer therapy is to inhibit biological capabilities of tumors and eventually eliminate the cancer cells. However, cancer cells are well known to escape apoptosis, a form of programmed cell death that was first described in studies of cell development and tissue remodelling. Increasing our understanding of cell death may result in new anticancer approaches that target types of nonapoptotic cell death, such as necroptosis, ferroptosis, autophagy-dependent cell death, and alkaliptosis. Notably, alkaliptosis, a pH-dependent form of regulated cell death, has been recently identified as a new strategy for cancer therapy across multiple tumor types, especially in pancreatic cancer.