Cellular redox homeostasis is an essential, dynamic process that ensures the balance between reducing and oxidizing reactions within cells and thus has implications across all areas of biology. Changes in levels of reactive oxygen species can disrupt redox homeostasis, leading to oxidative or reductive stress that contributes to the pathogenesis of many malignancies, including cancer. From transformation and tumor initiation to metastatic dissemination, increasing reactive oxygen species in cancer cells can paradoxically promote or suppress the tumorigenic process, depending on the extent of redox stress, its spatiotemporal characteristics and the tumor microenvironment. Here we review how redox regulation influences tumorigenesis, highlighting therapeutic opportunities enabled by redox-related alterations in cancer cells.

细胞氧化还原稳态是一个重要的动态过程，可确保细胞内还原和氧化反应之间的平衡，因此对生物学的所有领域都有影响。活性氧水平的变化会破坏氧化还原稳态，导致氧化或还原应激，从而导致包括癌症在内的许多恶性肿瘤的发病机制。从转化和肿瘤发生到转移扩散，癌细胞中活性氧的增加可以矛盾地促进或抑制致瘤过程，具体取决于氧化还原应激的程度、其时空特征和肿瘤微环境。在这里，我们回顾氧化还原调节如何影响肿瘤发生，强调癌细胞中氧化还原相关改变带来的治疗机会。