The Role of STAT3 in Thyroid Cancer

Thyroid cancer is the most common endocrine malignancy and its global incidence rates are rapidly increasing. Although the mortality of thyroid cancer is relatively low, its rate of recurrence or persistence is relatively high, contributing to incurability and morbidity of the disease. Thyroid cancer is mainly treated by surgery and radioiodine remnant ablation, which is effective only for non-metastasized primary tumors. Therefore, better understanding of the molecular targets available in this tumor is necessary. Similarly to many other tumor types, oncogenic molecular alterations in thyroid epithelium include aberrant signal transduction of the mitogen-activated protein kinase, phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase/AKT (also known as protein kinase B), NF-kappa B, and WNT/beta-catenin pathways. However, the role of the Janus kinase (JAK)/signal transducer and activator of transcription (STAT3) pathway, a well-known mediator of tumorigenesis in different tumor types, is relatively less understood in thyroid cancer. Intriguingly, recent studies have demonstrated that, in thyroid cancer, the JAK/STAT3 pathway may function in the context of tumor suppression rather than promoting tumorigenesis. In this review, we provide an update of STAT3 function in thyroid cancer and discuss some of the evidences that support this hypothesis.