Senescent remodeling of the innate and adaptive immune system in the elderly men with prostate cancer.

ABSTRACT

Despite years of intensive investigation that has been made in understanding prostate cancer, it remains a major cause of death in men worldwide. Prostate cancer emerges from multiple alterations that induce changes in expression patterns of genes and proteins that function in networks controlling critical cellular events. Based on the exponential aging of the population and the increasing life expectancy in industrialized Western countries, prostate cancer in the elderly men is becoming a disease of increasing significance. Aging is a progressive degenerative process strictly integrated with inflammation. Several theories have been proposed that attempt to define the role of chronic inflammation in aging including redox stress, mitochondrial damage, immunosenescence, and epigenetic modifications. Here, we review the innate and adaptive immune systems and their senescent remodeling in elderly men with prostate cancer.