In Vivo Oncolytic Virotherapy in Murine Models of Hepatocellular Carcinoma: A Systematic Review

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the third leading cause of cancer-related mortality worldwide. Current therapies often provide marginal survival benefits at the expense of undesirable side effects. Oncolytic viruses represent a novel strategy for the treatment of HCC due to their inherent ability to cause direct tumor cell lysis while sparing normal tissue and their capacity to stimulate potent immune responses directed against uninfected tumor cells and distant metastases. Oncolytic virotherapy (OVT) is a promising cancer treatment, but before it can become a standard option in practice, several challenges-systemic viral delivery optimization/enhancement, inter-tumoral virus dispersion, anti-cancer immunity cross-priming, and lack of artificial model systems-need to be addressed. Addressing these will require an in vivo model that accurately mimics the tumor microenvironment and allows the scientific community to design a more precise and accurate OVT. Due to their close physiologic resemblance to humans, murine cancer models are the likely preferred candidates. To provide an accurate assessment of the current state of in vivo OVT in HCC, we have reviewed a comprehensively searched body of work using murine in vivo HCC models for OVT.

Automated summary

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is a major cause of cancer-related mortality worldwide. Current therapies have limited effectiveness and undesirable side effects. Oncolytic viruses offer a promising strategy for HCC treatment due to their ability to directly destroy tumor cells and stimulate immune responses. However, there are challenges in viral delivery, tumor dispersion, immune priming, and lack of model systems. Murine cancer models are preferred for studying oncolytic virotherapy. Establishing an accurate in vivo model that mimics the tumor microenvironment is necessary for the development of precise and effective OVT.