Emerging concepts, hot topics, and open questions in today's pancreatic cancer research

Despite intense research, pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) remains one of the most lethal malignancies to date. The low 5-year survival rate of currently 8-10% has only marginally improved over the last years, necessitating novel approaches and a thinking "outside the box". We as translational basic and medical scientists working in a clinical research unit on tumor-stroma interactions in PDAC (the DFG-funded CRU325) have sought to identify emerging concepts in current pancreatic cancer research. We have addressed recent developments and open questions, covering a wide spectrum of topics, including clinical treatment, lifestyle, the tumor microenvironment, drug targeting, vaccination, and the microbiome. This selection of topics is highly personal and does not claim to be complete, yet it represents those areas that we believe may contribute to relevant developments in the near future. In our review, we not only briefly describe the state of the art but also pinpoint the potential of recent advances, while not ignoring current contradictions or uncertainties. Taken together, we provide our subjective view on upcoming topics in today's PDAC research landscape.