Mechanisms of Interferon Gamma-induced Apoptosis in Human Non-small Cell Lung Cancer

Lung cancer is the most common cancer in terms of both incidence and mortality worldwide. Among lung cancers, non-small cell lung carcinomas (NSCLC) account for approximately 80%–85% of lung cancer cases (Mitsudomi, 2010; Cancer, 2014). Despite improvements in survival through early detection and treatment of NSCLC, many patients suffer from rapid disease recurrence and progression (Xu et al., 2012; Zheng et al., 2013; Sun et al., 2014). Therefore, the search for new or alternative therapeutic approaches remains important and urgently needed in clinical cancer therapeutics. Interferon gamma (IFN-γ) is a pleiotropic cytokine with diverse physiological functions. IFN-γ is a major activator of various types of immune cells (Wakita et al., 2009; Hayakawa et al., 2011) and also can induce the expression of the major histocompatibility complex in both normal and malignant cells and provokes inflammatory