Table 1.

Summary of studies on irradiated CAFs regulating the biological functions of tumor cells.

Effect of CAFs	Tumor type	Results	Possible mechanisms	Reference
CAFs in tumorigenesis and proliferation	Lung	Increased survival	Increased expression of MMPs	[30]
	Lung and melanoma	Increased recurrence and survival	IGF1/2, CXCL12 and β-HB produced by CAFs induced autophagy	[47]
	Cervical cancer	Increased proliferation, migration, invasion, and radiosensitivity	Exosomes secreted by CAFs increased miR-1323 secretion	[48]
	PDAC	Promoted growth	A substantial increase in iNOS secreted by CAFs	[49]
CAFs in invasion and metastasis	PDAC	Promoted invasion	The levels of HGF remained unchanged, but the phosphorylation of the HGF receptor was increased	[52]
		Promoted invasion	Increased the expression of CAFs to CXCL12	[85]
	ESCC	Promoted invasion	HGF and β-catenin expression were increased, which can increase the phosphorylation of c-Met and MAPK activity	[51]
	SCC	Promoted invasion and growth	Enhancement of invasive growth-related molecules such as c-Met, Ras and laminin 5 and filamin A through TGF- β1-mediated bystander mechanism	[53]
ECM remodeling		Increased the amount of ECM protein	Increasd the number and activity of fibroblasts	[55]
		Catabolizes ECM	Increased the expression of MMPs	[55]
CAFs in angiogenesis	NSCLC	Reduced their pro-angiogenic properties	SDF-1, Ang-1, and TSP-2 were all downregulated, whereas the release of bFGF was upregulated	[58, 59]
CAFs promote radiotherapy resistance	PDAC	Enhanced radioresistance	Enhanced the CSC phenotype, as TGF-β participating	[63]
	CRC	Enhanced CSC clonogenicity and radioresistance	Exosomes derived from CAFs activated TGF-β signaling pathway	[64]
	Rectal cancer	Enhanced radioresistance	CAFs-derived exosomes contained higher miR-93-5p	[65]
	NSCLC	Enhanced radioresistance	The nine different MDM2 transcripts showed elevated expression levels	[39]
	ESCC	Enhanced radioresistance	Increased the expression of CAFs to CXCL1	[66]
	Nasopharyngeal carcinoma cells	Enhanced radioresistance	Increased the expression of CAFs to IL-8	[67]

Abbreviations: Ang-1 angiopoietin-1, bFGF basic fibroblast growth factor, CAFs cancer-associated fibroblasts, CRC colorectal cancer, CSC cancer stem cell, ECM extracellular matrix, ESCC esophageal squamous cell carcinoma, HGF hepatocyte growth factor, iNOS inducible nitric oxide synthase, MMP matrix metalloprotease, NSCLC non-small cell lung carcinoma, PDAC pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma, SCC squamous cell carcinoma, SDC1 cell surface proteoglycan synthesis sugar 1, SDF-1 stromal cell-derived factor 1, T thrombospondin-2, β-HB β-hydroxybutyrate.