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Updated: Dec 3, 2025

Using Primary Neurosphere Cultures to Study Primary Cilia
Published on: April 14, 2017
Functional aspects of primary cilium in signaling, assembly and microenvironment in cancer
Bo Wang1,2, Zheyong Liang1,2,3, Peijun Liu1,2
1Center for Translational Medicine, The First Affiliated Hospital of Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an, Shaanxi, China.
Abstract:
The primary cilium is an antennae-like structure extent outside the cell surface. It has an important role in regulating cell-signaling transduction to affect proliferation, differentiation and migration. Evidence is accumulating that ciliary defects lead to ciliopathies and ciliary deregulation also play crucial roles in cancer formation and progression. Interestingly, restoring the cilia can suppress proliferation in some cancer cell. However, t he role of primary cilia in cancer still be debated. In this article, we review the role of the primary cilium in cancer through architecture, signaling pathways, cilia assembly and disassembly regulators, and summarized the new findings of the primary cilium in tumor microenvironments and different cancers, highlighting novel possibilities for therapeutic target in cancer.
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