Exploiting metabolic vulnerabilities to improve cancer therapeutics

Over the past decade, our understanding of cancer metabolism has advanced significantly, revealing a complex and dynamic landscape of metabolic reprogramming that facilitates tumor progression and promotes therapeutic resistance. To survive under stressful conditions, cancer cells undergo crucial metabolic adaptations while also creating vulnerabilities that can be exploited for therapeutic purposes. Here, we discuss the evolving understanding of cancer cell metabolic adaptation in the tumor environment and the recent advances in identifying potential therapeutic mechanisms, including synthetic lethality, post-translational modifications (PTMs), as well as the interplay between metabolism and epigenetics. Furthermore, we discuss the integration of metabolic targeting with immune-based therapies and provide insights underscoring the potential of metabolic interventions to resensitize drug-resistant cancers and enhance efficacy for cancer treatment.