The roles of different signaling pathways and their related genes in the occurrence and development of colorectal cancer

Abstract

Colorectal cancer is a kind of malignancies with high incidence in the worldwide, that is seriously harmed human health. So far the pathogenesis of the disease is not fully understood, this causing many difficulties to the diagnosis and treatment of the disease, and resulting in the cure rates of disease is not ideal. With the development of molecular genetics and molecular biology, many oncogenes and tumor suppressor genes have been found to be associated with the disease, and this made it is possible to reveal the pathogenesis of colorectal cancer at the molecular level. However, it is a complex and multi-step process from normal colorectal epithelial cells transformed to colorectal cancer cells, and it is the results of polygenic and multifactorial interactions. Now it is thought that the Wnt, TGF-beta, PI3K/Akt, MAPK and p53 signaling pathways are closely associated with pathogenesis of colorectal cancer. Based on the five kinds of signaling pathways as the main line, this article reviewed the roles of different signaling pathways and their related genes in the pathogenesis of colorectal cancer. Key words: Colorectal neoplasms; Signaling pathways; Gene; Pathogenesis