Abstract: Mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPK) is a class of serine/threonine protein kinase. This cascade existed broadly in mammalian cells. The subfamily includes extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK), c-Jun N-terminal kinase (JNK) and p38MAPK. It is a significant signaling pathway to deliver extracellular signals into nucleus, involved in the important mechanisms of cell growth and proliferation. Recently studies found that function of p38MAPK, mediating many cell reactions induced by stress, inflammatory cytokines or bacterial products and changing the level of gene expression through phosphorylation of transcription factor and play an important role in cell functions, involved in the process of oophoroma cells apoptosis, invasion, metastasis and drug resistance. Therefore, the clarification of mechanism of p38MAPK pathway will provide new thoughts and methods for diagnosis and treatment of ovarian cancer. This review summarizes the function of p38MAPK signal transduction pathway in ovarian cancer, and the p38MAPK related research progress of new drugs and drug resistance.

Key words: p38 mitogen-activated protein kinase, Signal transduction, Signal pathway, Ovarian neoplasms, Drug resistance, neoplasm