Dual role of Snail1 as transcriptional repressor and activator

García de Herreros, Antonio

doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.bbcan.2023.189037

Dual role of Snail1 as transcriptional repressor and activator

Citation

García de Herreros A. Dual role of Snail1 as transcriptional repressor and activator. Biochim Biophys Acta Rev Cancer. 2024 Jan;1879(1):189037. DOI: 10.1016/j.bbcan.2023.189037

Abstract

Snail1 transcriptional factor plays a key role in the control of epithelial to mesenchymal transition, a process that remodels tumor cells increasing their invasion and chemo-resistance as well as reprograms their metabolism and provides stemness properties. During this transition, Snail1 acts as a transcriptional repressor and, as growing evidences have demonstrated, also as a direct activator of mesenchymal genes. In this review, I describe the different proteins that interact with Snail1 and are responsible for these two different functions on gene expression; I focus on the transcriptional factors that associate to Snail1 in their target promoters, both activated and repressed. I also present working models for Snail1 action both as repressor and activator and raise some issues that still need to be investigated.