Apoptotic Cell Death: Important Cellular Process as Chemotherapeutic Target

Apoptosis is a biological feature, which causes programmed cell death. It consists of two pathways, namely extrinsic and intrinsic, and mitochondria are the site of apoptotic process completion. An abnormality in the apoptotic process can make cells immoral, which is one of the major characteristics of cancer cell formation and cancer development. Chemotherapeutic molecules, which have been used as anticancer drugs, or drugs under investigations, have mostly designed in a way that they can revert apoptotic abnormalities or induce apoptosis. This book chapter discusses the apoptotic process and its abnormalities in cancer cells, and how chemotherapeutic drugs can induce apoptosis, with most advanced and updated findings on mechanisms of action.