The role of the plasminogen activation system in angiogenesis and metastasis

A substantial body of data now supports the central role of the uPA system in tumor angiogenesis and metastasis. The components of this system have both negative and positive regulatory roles in these processes, which may depend on time, place, and location of the cell and the expression of the components of this system. A major challenge in the uPA field is how to translate the wealth of biological information now available to obtain therapeutically useful agents. As with other important biological cascades (e.g., MMPs) that have been implicated in tumor progression and angiogenesis, the relevance of the uPA system to human disease will not be fully understood until relevant clinical approaches that specifically modulate the activity of this system are developed and moved into human testing.