Objective Due to high cytotoxicity effect, ribonucleases (RNases) are known as pharmacological agents with therapeutic potential. The high potential of these enzymes in the destruction of RNA strand and their other substrates and subsequently, cell destruction or cessation of cell division causes a very high cytotoxic effect of this enzyme in various cancer cells. Hence, this review investigates the therapeutic applications of ribonucleases, cell pathways and their mode of action as cytotoxic agents in order to pay attention to them in researches related to the health and therapy fields. Materials and methods In this study the keywords such as cancer, ribonuclease, ribonuclease inhibitor and RNA were used to search in databases including Scopus, SID, IranDoc, PubMed, Google Scholar, Web of Science and IranMedex. In order to select the documents used, all articles published in non- English and Persian languages, duplicate articles, articles that could not be accessed to the full text, as well as articles that were presented as abstracts were removed. Finally, the selected cases were thoroughly studied and summarized in order to prepare the current review. Results The study and review of research conducted showed that ribonucleases have the ability to kill tumor cells and that these enzymes have antiviral properties. Bovine pancreatic ribonuclease (RNase A), bovine seminal ribonuclease (BS-RNase), Onconase, and angiogenin are known as RNases with high antitumor activity which exert cytotoxic activity on cancer cells selectively by involving different cellular pathways and/ or enhance the cytotoxicity by mutation. Also, the study of articles related to the function of ribonucleases showed that the investigation of genetic pathways of synthesis and mechanisms of cytotoxicity in these enzymes will provide the development of new pharmaceutical products in the future. Utilization of engineering processes and chemical changes in ligand / receptor structure may increase the toxicity of ribonuclease molecules in order to select cytotoxic pathways on malignant cells. Therefore, it is necessary to discover the therapeutic potential and to study in detail the therapeutic values of ribonucleases. Conclusions Ribonucleases are potentially bioavailable drug candidates, and in regard to their toxicity, which is based on the selective hydrolysis of intracellular RNA molecules and specific cell membrane recognition processes, these enzymes can be used as anti-tumor drugs or therapeutic agents.

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