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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2007 Oct 29.
Published in final edited form as: Cells Tissues Organs. 2007;185(1-3):131–145. doi: 10.1159/000101314

Fig. 2.

Fig. 2

Can TGF-β signaling complete all stages of EMT? (i) Typical epithelial cells have apical basal polarity, seats on basement membrane, are rich with epithelial markers such as tight junction proteins (e.g. ZO1), adherens junction proteins (e.g. E-cadherin) and desmosomes. (ii) Upon TGF-β signaling these epithelial markers are repressed. Once these proteins are lost, epithelial cells get isolated from their adjacent cells. (iii) Individual epithelial cells begin to transform to mesenchymal cells, interact and degrade basement membrane proteins (basal lamina) while they rearrange their cytoskeletal proteins (e.g. α-smooth muscle actin, microtubles and intermediate filaments) which help in acquiring front-end back-end polarity. (iv) TGF-β signaling also activates the mesenchymal markers vimentin and fibronectin to become full-blown mesenchymal cells for migration through the ECM.