# Context-dependent roles of complement in cancer

Source: https://onco.cc/key-papers/paper-roumenina-nat-rev-cancer/  
OnCo record `paper-roumenina-nat-rev-cancer` (Key paper). Data CC BY-NC 4.0, attribute "Data from OnCo (onco.cc)"; commercial use needs a licence.

## TL;DR

Paper cited by one pathway page, indexed on Europe PMC as PubMed record 31666715 and published in Nature Reviews Cancer; the citing page links this DOI, which is how the record was matched.

## Summary

The tumour microenvironment (TME) highly influences the growth and spread of tumours, thus impacting the patient's clinical outcome. In this context, the complement system plays a major and complex role. It may either act to kill antibody-coated tumour cells, support local chronic inflammation or hamper antitumour T cell responses favouring tumour progression. Recent studies demonstrate that these opposing effects are dependent upon the sites of complement activation, the composition of the TME and the tumour cell sensitivity to complement attack. In this Review, we present the evidence that has so far accrued showing a role for complement activation and its effects on cancer control and clinical outcome under different TME contexts. We also include a new analysis of the publicly available transcriptomic data to provide an overview of the prognostic value of complement gene expression in 30 cancer types. We argue that the interplay of complement components within each cancer type is unique, governed by the properties of the tumour cells and the TME. This concept is of critical importance for the design of efficient therapeutic strategies aimed at targeting complement components and their signalling.

Indexed on Europe PMC as PubMed record 31666715 (DOI 10.1038/s41568-019-0210-0). Matched by DOI alone: one pathway page cites this DOI among its external links (the pages are listed under Related), and this page was written so that the citation resolves inside OnCo. No figure has been checked by an editor.

## Fields

- Kind: Key paper
- Last checked: 2026-09-22
- Tags: europepmc-ingest
- Journal: Nature Reviews Cancer
- Year: 2019
- DOI: 10.1038/s41568-019-0210-0
- Authors: Roumenina LT, Daugan MV, Petitprez F, et al.
- What it means: One pathway page on OnCo cites this paper by its DOI; this record gives the citation a page of its own so a reader can follow it without leaving OnCo. Read the abstract above alongside the citing page listed under Related; the record was created automatically from the Europe PMC entry and its figures have not been checked by hand.
- Caveats: Matched to the citing OnCo records by DOI alone; the summary reproduces the Europe PMC abstract and no figure has been verified against the full paper.

## Sources

- Nat Rev Cancer 2019: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41568-019-0210-0
- PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31666715/
- Europe PMC: https://europepmc.org/article/MED/31666715

## Connected records

- pathways: [Complement in cancer](https://onco.cc/pathways/complement-in-cancer/)
- journals: [Nature Reviews Cancer](https://onco.cc/journals/nature-reviews-cancer/)

---
JSON: https://onco.cc/api/v1/entities/paper-roumenina-nat-rev-cancer.json