Review Summary Fascin protein and tumor

Abstract

Fascin protein is a member of the actin binding protein Fascin. Initially, Fascin protein was discovered by Bryan J et al. in sea urchin and ocyte in the 70s of the 20th century, and they conducted its separation and purification ^{[1, 2, 3]}. In 1993 through the cDNA sequential information of echinoderm’s Fascin protein ^[4], it was revealed that it featured homology with the Drosophila singed protein ^[5], human 55kD actin binding protein ^[6] and the orthologues in other vertebrates homology ^{[7, 8, 9]}, and it was also found that they did not feature homology with other discovered actin binding protein; therefore, they were classified into a new actin binding protein family-Fascin protein family.

The mammalian genome encodes three Fascin genes, i.e. Fascin 1, Fascin 2 and Fascin 3. In humans, the gene that encodes Fascin1 is located at 7p22 of the chromosome, while those of Fascin 2 and Fascin 3 are respectively located at 17q25 and 7q31 ^{[10, 11, 12]}. Fascin 10 protein is widely distributed in mesenchymal tissue and the nervous system, while Fascin 2 and Fascin 3 are specially expressed in retina and testis. ^{[8, 13, 14]}. Although several kinds of Fascin protein have been found, currently the mostly studies is still human Fascin 1(hereinafter referred to as Fascin), and in this paper, it only