Abstract
Tumor stroma plays key roles in promoting tumor recurrence and treatment resistance. Cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs) are one of the most abundant and key components in the stroma of lung cancer. CAFs secrete a variety of inflammatory cytokines and extracellular matrix to form a desmoplastic tumor niche, which play important roles in the occurrence and development of lung cancer. CAFs are mainly derived from normal lung fibroblasts, which are transformed by tumor-derived cytokines. The diverse sources of CAFs lead to great heterogeneity in different CAFs subgroups. Although many studies support that CAFs promote tumor growth, but evolving data also argue for their antitumor actions. The putative bimodal function in oncogenesis of CAFs bring great challenges to the clinical application of CAFs-targeted therapies. This review focuses on the characteristics and functional research of CAFs, and emphasizes the roles and specificity of CAFs in the development of lung cancer.