Department of Experimental Medicine 1, Nikolaus-Fiebiger Center for Molecular Medicine, Friedrich-Alexander University of Erlangen-Nürnberg, Erlangen, Germany.
EMBO J. 2021 Sep 15;40(18):e108647. doi: 10.15252/embj.2021108647. Epub 2021 Aug 30.
The process of epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) is fundamental for embryonic morphogenesis. Cells undergoing it lose epithelial characteristics and integrity, acquire mesenchymal features, and become motile. In cancer, this program is hijacked to confer essential changes in morphology and motility that fuel invasion. In addition, EMT is increasingly understood to orchestrate a large variety of complementary cancer features, such as tumor cell stemness, tumorigenicity, resistance to therapy and adaptation to changes in the microenvironment. In this review, we summarize recent findings related to these various classical and non-classical functions, and introduce EMT as a true tumorigenic multi-tool, involved in many aspects of cancer. We suggest that therapeutic targeting of the EMT process will-if acknowledging these complexities-be a possibility to concurrently interfere with tumor progression on many levels.
上皮-间充质转化（EMT）过程对于胚胎形态发生至关重要。经历 EMT 的细胞会失去上皮特征和完整性，获得间充质特征，并变得具有迁移能力。在癌症中，这个程序被劫持，赋予了形态和迁移的重要变化，从而促进了侵袭。此外，EMT 越来越被理解为协调大量互补的癌症特征，如肿瘤细胞干性、致瘤性、对治疗的抵抗性和对微环境变化的适应性。在这篇综述中，我们总结了最近与这些各种经典和非经典功能相关的发现，并将 EMT 引入为一种真正的肿瘤发生多功能工具，参与癌症的许多方面。我们认为，如果承认这些复杂性，针对 EMT 过程的治疗靶向将有可能同时在多个层面上干扰肿瘤的进展。
