Figure 2.

Tumor microenvironmental stress and cancer progression. During cancer progression, cancer cells are constantly exposed to diverse cytotoxic stressors in harsh tumor environments, such as nutrient starvation, hypoxia, oxidative stress, inflammation, oxidative stress, pH changes, shear stress, immune response, and chemotherapy. Stress response activation increases their capacity to survive in environmental conditions encountered during dissemination and confers a survival advantage for tumor growth, metastasis, dormancy, and drug-resistance.