Fig. 3.

Alternative approaches to target Myc. a Targeting Myc through the downregulation of Myc protein level and restraining the oncogenic activity of hyperactivated Myc. Targeting the transcription of Myc is a straightforward method to target Myc alternatively either through stabilizing the G-quadruplex structure with small molecules or blockading the signal transduction from MYC to RNA polymerase. The inhibition of the translation process from MYC mRNA to Myc through targeting critical proteins involved in the translation initiation or MYC mRNA stability could also be considered. Other alternative ways to target Myc are hijacking the UPS system to downregulate the Myc protein level, blocking the free access of Myc to its target, and disrupting the interface between Myc and Max. b Targeting Myc through synthetic lethality. Myc-deregulated cancer cells reshuffle the inner signal modules and rely on specific signal components to meet the growing demands to thrive as compared to the normal cells. The inhibition of such components leads to synthetic lethality of cancer cells with Myc overexpression. Conversely, normal cells have abundant complementary signaling pathways to buffer such inhibition and yet be viable