Apoptosis, Senescence and Cancer provides insight into established practices and research into apoptosis and senescence by thoroughly examining novel and emerging techniques and research in the fields of cell death pathways, senescence growth arrest, drugs and resistance, DNA damage response, and other topics which still hold mysteries for researchers.

The volume is divided into six easy to follow sections. The first is Apoptosis and Alternative Modes of Cell Death, followed by chapters on Telomeres and Telomerase, Senescence, Genomic Instability and Tumorigenesis. The third part covers DNA Damage Response, Signaling Pathways and Tumorigenesis, while the fourth delves into Resistance and Sensitization. The book concludes with Established Cancer Therapies and a section which looks toward the future with Recent and Developing Cancer Therapies.

In total, this volume provides basic scientists and clinicians with a deeper and more complete understanding of the cellular responses of malignancies which may determine the effectiveness of treatment, both in the initial stages of the disease as well as in disease recurrence.

Table of contents
Section I: Apoptosis and Alternative Models of Cell Death

Chapter 1. The intrinsic pathway of apoptosis. Scott H. Kaufman

Chapter 2. The extrinsic pathway of apoptosis. M. Stacey Ricci and Wafik S. El-Deiry

Chapter 3. Evaluating the importance of apoptosis and other determinants of cell death and survival. Bradley G. Wouters and Roland K. Chiu

Chapter 4. Mitotic catastrophe. Fiorenza Ianzini and Michael A. Mackey

Chapter 5. Autophagy and autophagic cell death. Mojgan Djavaheri-Mergny, Joelle Botti and Patrice Codogno

Chapter 6. Regulation and function of detachment-induced cell death (anoikis) in cancer progression and metastasis. David J. McConkey and Victor Bondar



Section II. Telomeres and Telomerase, Senescence, Genomic Instability and Tumorigenesis

Chapter 7. Structure and function of the telomere. Jay E. Johnson and Dominique Broccoli

Chapter 8. Overview of Senescence. Ruben D. Ramirez

Chapter 9. Contributions of telomerase to tumorigenesis. Richard Possemato and William C. Hahn

Chapter 10. The role of telomeres in genomic instability. John P. Murnane



Section III. DNA Damage Response, Signaling Pathways and Tumorigenesis

Chapter 11. Overview of the DNA damage checkpoint -- ATM and ATR. Aude Dupre and Jean Gautier

Chapter 12. Interactions between myc and cyclin dependent kinase inhibitors in cancer. Kirsteen H. Maclean and John L. Cleveland

Chapter 13. Interplay between H2AX and 53BP1 pathways in DNA double strand break repair response. Fatouros Chronis and Emmy P. Rogakou

Chapter 14. DNA-dependent protein kinase in repair, apoptosis, telomere maintenance and chemotherapy. Lawrence F. Povirk



Section IV. Resistance and Sensitization

Chapter 15. Resistance/signaling pathways. Paul Dent

Chapter 16. Ceramide and multi-drug resistance. Myles C. Cabot

Chapter 17. Chemo and radio-sensitization through inhibition of PI3/Akt signaling. Debra L. Smith, Laura K. Nolden, Gordon B. Mills and Yiling Lu

Chapter 18. The advancement of epidermal growth factor receptor inhibitors in cancer therapy. Gregory W. Allen and Paul M. Harari



Section V. Established Cancer Therapies

Chapter 19. Antimetabolites. Janet A. Houghton

Chapter 20. Topoiseomerase I poisons and apoptotic topoisomerase I-DNA complexes. Olivier Sordet, Yves Pommier and Eric Solary

Chapter 21. Perturbations of cellular functions by topoisomerase II inhibitors: all roads lead to cell death? Annette K. Larsen and Andrzej Skladanowski

Chapter 22. The significance of poly-targeting in apoptosis induction by alkylating agents and platinum drugs. Jan M. Woynarowski and Barbara A. Woynarowska

Chapter 23. Contributions of apoptosis and senescence to cytotoxicity produced by microtubule stabilizing agents. Laura E. Klein and Susan B. Horwitz



Section VI. Recent and Developing Cancer Therapies

Chapter 24. Tyrosine kinase inhibitors. Michael Deininger

Chapter 25. Humanized antibodies. Morton Coleman and Richard Furman

Chapter 26. Role of apoptosis in anti-angiogenic cancer therapies. Jennifer A. Doll, Jennifer E. Hobbs and Gerald A. Soff

Chapter 27. Photodynamic therapy-induced apoptosis. Nancy L. Oleinick, Rachel L. Morris and Anna Lisa Nieminen

Chapter 28. Modulation of TRAIL signaling for cancer therapy. Simone Fulda and Klaus-Michael Debatin