Adhesion Signaling in Cancer: Integrin Regulation, Cell Migration, and Genome Stability

Cell adhesion is not only essential for tissue organization, but also functions as a dynamic signaling platform that regulates cytoskeletal remodeling, gene expression, and cell-cycle progression. In cancer, dysregulated adhesion signaling, including integrin–FAK–Src pathways, alters how cells respond to mechanical and biochemical cues, promoting abnormal migration and invasion while also perturbing mitosis, cytokinesis, and DNA damage responses. Together, these processes create adhesion-dependent regulatory states that influence whether cells maintain genome integrity, undergo arrest, or progress toward chromosomal instability and malignant evolution.This Research Topic will highlight the molecular mechanisms linking integrin-mediated adhesion to cell migration, metastasis, and genome stability. We particularly encourage submissions examining how adhesion-driven signaling and mechanics shape metastatic traits, including adhesion turnover, traction-force generation, extracellular matrix remodeling, invadopodia formation, collective migration, and survival under detachment conditions such as anoikis resistance. We also welcome studies exploring how adhesion state affects centrosome dynamics, spindle assembly and positioning, chromosome segregation, and cytokinetic abscission timing, together with downstream consequences including replication stress and chromosomal instability.In addition, we invite contributions addressing how oncogenic stresses, including oxidative stress and virus-associated oncogenesis, intersect with adhesion and cytoskeletal pathways to promote DNA damage, telomere dysfunction, and telomere maintenance programs such as alternative lengthening of telomeres (ALT), as well as altered cell fate decisions. We also encourage studies on emerging regulatory layers, including non-coding RNAs, chromatin-associated mechanisms, and stress- or immune-related signaling pathways that modulate adhesion-driven cancer phenotypes and tumor–microenvironment interactions.We welcome original research, methods, and focused reviews using cell and animal models, patient-derived systems, and systems-level approaches. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to, integrin signaling networks, including FAK/Src, Rho GTPases, and mechanotransduction; focal adhesion dynamics and migration or invasion programs; adhesion-dependent regulation of mitotic entry, spindle organization, and centrosome separation; cytokinesis and abscission timing under attachment versus detachment conditions; adhesion-linked DNA damage signaling, telomere maintenance including ALT, and chromosomal instability; oxidative and virus-driven routes to genome instability; and regulatory contributions from non-coding RNAs and chromatin remodeling to adhesion, migration, and genome maintenance pathways. Topic editors: Siamak A. Kamranvar, Aditya Sarode Source: https://www.frontiersin.org/research-topics/78127/adhesion-signaling-in-cancer-integrin-regulation-cell-migration-and-genome-stability