Department of Surgery and Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center, University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, FL 33136, USA.
Nat Rev Cancer. 2011 May;11(5):338-51. doi: 10.1038/nrc3035. Epub 2011 Apr 14.
The discovery of Notch in Drosophila melanogaster nearly a century ago opened the door to an ever-widening understanding of cellular processes that are controlled or influenced by Notch signalling. As would be expected with such a pleiotropic pathway, the deregulation of Notch signalling leads to several pathological conditions, including cancer. A role for Notch is well established in haematological malignancies, and more recent studies have provided evidence for the importance of Notch activity in solid tumours. As it is thought to act as an oncogene in some cancers but as a tumour suppressor in others, the role of Notch in solid tumours seems to be highly context dependent.
近一个世纪前，在果蝇中发现 Notch 开启了对细胞过程的理解之门，这些细胞过程受到 Notch 信号的控制或影响。正如这样一个多功能途径所预期的那样， Notch 信号的失调导致了几种病理状况，包括癌症。 Notch 在血液恶性肿瘤中具有重要作用，最近的研究提供了证据表明 Notch 活性在实体瘤中的重要性。由于 Notch 在某些癌症中被认为是致癌基因，而在其他癌症中则是肿瘤抑制基因，因此 Notch 在实体瘤中的作用似乎高度依赖于上下文。
