Fig. 1

The Core Regulatory Machinery of EMT. Tumorigenesis activate EMT-promoting transcription factors of the TWIST, SNAIL and ZEB families through pathways known to play critical roles in both embryogenesis and tumour development, including the WNT, NOTCH, TGF-β, RAS and NF-κB cascades. MicroRNAs suppress production of these transcription factors as well as multiple markers defining the epithelial or mesenchymal characteristics. These microRNAs can therefore promote EMT (blue) or repress EMT and enhance MET programs (orange)