World J Gastroenterol. 2011 Feb 14;17(6):681-90. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v17.i6.681.
Membrane microdomains or lipid rafts are known to be highly dynamic and to act as selective signal transduction mediators that facilitate interactions between the cell's external and internal environments. Lipid rafts play an important mediating role in the biology of cancer: they have been found in almost all existing experimental cancer models, including colorectal cancer (CRC), and play key regulatory roles in cell migration, metastasis, cell survival and tumor progression. This paper explores the current state of knowledge in this field by highlighting some of the pioneering and recent lipid raft studies performed on different CRC cell lines and human tissue samples. From this literature review, it becomes clear that membrane microdomains appear to be implicated in all key intracellular signaling pathways for lipid metabolism, drug resistance, cell adhesion, cell death, cell proliferation and many other processes in CRC. All signal transduction pathways seem to originate directly from those peculiar lipid islands, thereby orchestrating the colon cancer cells' state and fate. As confirmed by recent animal and preclinical studies in different CRC models, continuing to unravel the structure and function of lipid rafts - including their associated complex signaling pathways - will likely bring us one step closer to better monitoring and treating of colon cancer patients.
膜微区或脂筏被认为是高度动态的，作为选择性信号转导介质发挥作用，促进细胞内外环境之间的相互作用。脂筏在癌症生物学中起着重要的介导作用：它们几乎存在于所有现有的实验性癌症模型中，包括结直肠癌（CRC），并在细胞迁移、转移、细胞存活和肿瘤进展中发挥关键的调节作用。本文通过强调在不同 CRC 细胞系和人类组织样本上进行的一些开创性和最近的脂筏研究，探讨了该领域的现有知识状况。从文献综述中可以清楚地看出，膜微区似乎与 CRC 中脂质代谢、耐药性、细胞黏附、细胞死亡、细胞增殖和许多其他过程的所有关键细胞内信号通路有关。所有的信号转导通路似乎都直接起源于这些特殊的脂质岛，从而协调结肠癌细胞的状态和命运。正如不同 CRC 模型中的最近动物和临床前研究所证实的那样，继续阐明脂筏的结构和功能——包括其相关的复杂信号通路——可能会使我们更接近更好地监测和治疗结肠癌患者。
