Fig. 1

Various regulations of ZNF proteins’ functions in cancer progression. The versatile roles of ZNF proteins in cancer progression can be regulated at different levels. Differential expression of ZNF proteins in different cancer types can be regulated by 1) cancer-related miRNAs, including miR-199a-3p, miR-525-3p, miR-940 and miR-31, or 2) different environmental stimuli, which activate signaling cascades and therefore fine-tune ZNF protein functions through various of PTMs, including phosphorylation (P) and acetylation (Ac). 3) ZNF proteins at different protein domains or with various PTMs recruit different interacting proteins namely X, including transcription co-activators/co-repressors, chromatin modifiers and other transcription factors, to activate or suppress downstream genes. 4) ZNF proteins show diverse sequence-specific DNA binding abilities due to different combinations of zinc finger motifs shown as boxes