Abstract

Although the role of serine/threonine protein kinase C (PKC) in malignant transformation is known from decades, an anti-PKC based approach in cancer therapy was hampered for the difficulties in developing pharmacological compounds able to selectively inhibit specific PKC isoforms. In this review, the role of PKC-η and PKC-δ in promoting and counteracting tumor progression in different types of cancer, respectively, will be discussed in relationship with promising therapeutic perspectives based either on small molecule inhibitors or on natural compounds. Among a miriad of molecules able to modulate PKC activity, we will focus on the role of the enzastaurin and briostatin-1, which already entered clinical trials for several human cancers.

Keywords: PKC, apoptosis, differentiation, tumorigenesis