Role of tumor microenvironment in hematological malignancies

The dynamic homeostasis typical of hematopoiesis is orchestrated by the bone marrow microenvironment, along with the hematopoietic system interaction, responding to different stress and damages. In this context, hematological malignant cells reshape the microenvironment to create a cancer-permissive niche, prompting tumor cell survival, proliferation, invasion, angiogenesis, drug resistance, and immune-escape. The latter is also mediated by the metabolic rewire typical of cancer cells, affecting the bone marrow microenvironment. For this reason, the tumor niche represents a bona-fide sanctuary site for malignant cells, due to the secretion of growth factors, pro-angiogenic molecules and direct interactions involving several surface proteins. Unravelling the signaling pathways by which tumor cells corrupt their microenvironment might lead to new opportunities to understand how to target the tumor niche, possibly improving the current therapies with new pharmacological strategies directed toward the eradication of tumor cells.