High aggressiveness of papillary thyroid cancer: from clinical evidence to regulatory cellular networks

The global incidence of thyroid cancer has increased over recent decades. Papillary thyroid cancer (PTC) is the most common type of thyroid cancer and accounts for nearly 90% of all cases. Typically, PTC has a good prognosis. However, some PTC variants exhibit more aggressive behaviour, which significantly increases the risk of postoperative recurrence. Over the past decade, the high metastatic potential of PTC has drawn the attention of many researchers and these studies have provided useful molecular markers for improved diagnosis, risk stratification and clinical approaches. The aim of this review is to discuss the progress in epidemiology, metastatic features, risk factors and molecular mechanisms associated with PTC aggressiveness. We present a detailed picture showing that epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition, cancer metabolic reprogramming, alterations in important signalling pathways, epigenetic aberrations and the tumour microenvironment are crucial drivers of PTC metastasis. Further research is needed to more fully elucidate the pathogenesis and biological behaviour underlying the aggressiveness of PTC.