Nitric Oxide (NO) and Cancer

The Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine was awarded in 1998 to Doctors Furchgott, Ignarro, and Murad for their discoveries concerning Nitric oxide (NO) as a signaling molecule in the cardiovascular system. NO-inducing cell signaling events within the cell producing it and the diffusibility to NO in other cells have led to the discovery of many other physiological functions in many different types of cells including cancer. Noteworthy, nitroglycerin that has been used for the treatment of chest pain and associated cardiovascular diseases is currently being investigated for its therapeutic effect in clinical studies in patients with cancer. Further, several NO donor compounds have shown, in preclinical studies, anti-tumoral chemopreventive and therapeutic activities. Nitric Oxide and Cancer: Prognosis, Prevention and Therapy , edited by Benjamin Bonavida, Ph.D., reviews several novel applications of NO in cancer, a new field that has rapidly gained credibility and understanding at the biochemical and molecular levels. The various chapters in this comprehensive volume (25 contributions), written by noted experts in the field, bring up-to-date our current understanding and prospective future clinical applications of NO.