Liver cancer arises on the background of chronic liver diseases. (Image: Raycat / iStock)
Liver cancer is the second-leading cause of cancer-related death and represents the fastest rising cancer worldwide. In most cases, the tumor develops in patients with chronic liver disease. Such diseases include chronic infections with hepatitis viruses or a so-called fatty liver due to nutritional or genetically caused lipometabolic disorders or an excessive consumption of alcohol. An international team of researchers headed up by UZH Professor Achim Weber from the Institute of Pathology and Molecular Pathology of the University Hospital Zurich and Mathias Heikenwälder, professor at the German Cancer Research Center in Heidelberg, Germany, has discovered a major mechanism in the development of liver cancer. One of the main players in this process is enzyme caspase-8, which assumes an important dual role. Short-term protection at the price of long-term development of cancer. This protein is therefore jointly responsible for triggering programmed cell death, apoptosis, in diseased liver cells.
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