To explore the role of adverse socioeconomic conditions, such as neighborhood deprivation, in shaping squamous cell carcinoma (SCCa) outcomes and the potential underlying mechanisms.
Approach:
Mechanisms of Influence: Discusses how chronic stress activates the HPA axis and sympathetic nervous system, leading to dysregulated immune signaling and proinflammatory gene expression.
Epigenetic Modifications: Examines DNA methylation, histone modification, and miRNA dysregulation as mediators of stress-related effects on SCCa.
Genomic Patterns: Highlights distinct race- and neighborhood-specific DNAm patterns in SCCa, including differential methylation of specific genes.
Therapeutic Strategies: Reviews the efficacy of various therapeutic strategies targeting biological mediators in SCCa.
Social Context in Genomic Analysis: Suggests incorporating social context into tumor genomic analysis through geospatial modeling and neighborhood epigenomic profiling.
Key Findings:
Neighborhood deprivation impacts SCCa outcomes through biological mechanisms related to chronic stress.
Chronic stress leads to a proinflammatory state that affects tumor biology.
Distinct DNAm patterns in SCCa are influenced by race and neighborhood-specific factors.
Therapeutic strategies targeting stress-related biological mediators show variable efficacy in SCCa models.
Interpretation:
Social genomics provides insights into the interaction of socio-environmental exposures with the epigenome and tumor biology, influencing disparities in SCCa outcomes.
Limitations:
The review does not provide specific data on the efficacy of therapeutic strategies targeting biological mediators.
Further research is needed to integrate geospatial and multi-omics data to better understand SCCa outcomes.
Conclusion:
Future research should focus on integrating social context into cancer prevention and treatment strategies.
