Acute vs. chronic vs. intermittent hypoxia in breast Cancer: a review on its application in in vitro research

Hypoxia has been linked to elevated instances of therapeutic resistance in breast cancer. The exposure of proliferating cancer cells to hypoxia has been shown to induce an aggressive phenotype conducive to invasion and metastasis. Regions of the primary tumors in the breast may be exposed to different types of hypoxia including acute, chronic or intermittent. Intermittent hypoxia (IH), also called cyclic hypoxia, is caused by exposure to cycles of hypoxia and reoxygenation (H-R cycles). Importantly, there is currently no consensus amongst the scientific community on the total duration of hypoxia, the oxygen level, and the possible presence of H-R cycles. In this review, we discuss current methods of hypoxia research, to explore how exposure regimes used in experiments are connected to signaling by different hypoxia inducible factors (HIFs) and to distinct cellular responses in the context of the hallmarks of cancer. We highlight discrepancies in the existing literature on hypoxia research within the field of breast cancer in particular and propose a clear definition of acute, chronic, and intermittent hypoxia based on HIF activation and cellular responses: (i) acute hypoxia is when the cells are exposed for no more than 24 h to an environment with 1% O(2) or less; (ii) chronic hypoxia is when the cells are exposed for more than 48 h to an environment with 1% O(2) or less and (iii) intermittent hypoxia is when the cells are exposed to at least two rounds of hypoxia (1% O(2) or less) separated by at least one period of reoxygenation by exposure to normoxia (8.5% O(2) or higher). Our review provides for the first time a guideline for definition of hypoxia related terms and a clear foundation for hypoxia related in vitro (breast) cancer research. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s11033-022-07802-6.