Tamoxifen is a time-honored breast cancer drug used to treat millions of women with early-stage and less-aggressive disease, and now a University of Rochester Medical Center team has shown how to exploit tamoxifen’s secondary activities so that it

According to the results of a new multi-center study published in the journal Radiology, the use of three-dimensional breast imaging, known as tomosynthesis, could improve diagnostic accuracy.

In a new UCSF study of more than 2 million mammogram screenings performed on nearly 700,000 women in the United States, scientists for the first time show a direct link between reduced hormone therapy and declines in ductal carcinomaterm in situ (DCIS) as well as invasive breast cancer. The researchers saw such a striking decrease, they believe they also have uncovered indirect evidence that hormones promote breast tumor growth.

 PITTSBURGH, Nov. 29 – Breast cancers that arise sporadically, rather than through inheritance of certain genes, likely start with defects of DNA repair mechanisms that allow environmentally triggered mutations to accumulate, according to researchers at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Magee-Womens Hospital of UPMC and the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute.

CHICAGO – Women with a personal history of breast cancer should consider annual screening with MRI in addition to mammography, according to a study presented today at the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA).

Two thirds of breast cancers are ERalpha-positive, i.e., many estrogen receptors of the ERalpha- type are found in their cells. "These molecules can interact with the estrogen hormone and, thus, even lead to cancer," explains Dr. Joerg Hoheisel; molecular biologist at DKFZ. "The connection between the levels of the estrogen receptor alpha and the occurrence of breast cancer has been known for some time now. Early-stage breast cancer cells already produce too many of these receptors.

BOSTON (Nov. 23, 2010) —Breast cancer stem cells (CSCs), the aggressive cells thought to be resistant to current anti-cancer therapies and which promote metastasistermterm, are stimulated by estrogen via a pathway that mirrors normal stem cell development. Disrupting the pathway, researchers were able to halt the expansion of breast CSCs, a finding that suggests a new drug therapy target.

The landmark breast cancer screening study of women 40-49, published online in Cancer, has proven that annual mammography screening of women in their 40s reduces the breast cancer death rate in these women by nearly 30 percent. The results of this largest study ever conducted on women in this age group confirm that the use of the age of 50 as a threshold for breast cancer screening is scientifically unfounded. Women should begin getting annual mammograms at age 40.

New scientific research from the University of Southampton has revealed that a plant compound in watercress may have the ability to suppress breast cancer cell development by 'turning off' a signal in the body and thereby starving the growing tumour of essential blood and oxygen. The research, unveiled at a press conference today (14 September 2010), shows that the watercress compound is able to interfere with the function of a protein which plays a critical role in cancer development.

Twenty years of screening for breast and prostate cancer – the most diagnosed cancer for women and men – have not brought the anticipated decline in deaths from these diseases, argue experts from the University of California, San Francisco and the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio in an opinion piece published in the "Journal of the American Medical Association."

There is concern that mastectomy is over-utilized in the United States, which raises questions about the role of surgeons and patient preference in treatment selection for breast cancer. New data from an observational study found that breast-conserving surgery was presented and provided in the majority of patients evaluated. Surgeon recommendations, patient decisions, and failure of breast-conserving surgery were all found to be contributing factors to the mastectomy rate.

DURHAM, N.C. -- One person's breast cancer is not the same as another person's, because the gene mutations differ in each tumor. That makes it difficult to match the best therapy with the individual patient.

Using a finding that the genetic complexity of tumors in mice parallels that in humans, researchers at the Duke University Institute for Genome Sciences and Policy and Duke University Medical Center are starting trial studies in mice, just like human clinical trials, to evaluate whether understanding tumor diversity can improve cancer treatment.

HOUSTON - Researchers at The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center have identified a protein that marks the tumor suppressor p53 for destruction, providing a potential new avenue for restoring p53 in cancer cells.

The new protein, called Trim24, feeds p53 to a protein-shredding complex known as the proteasome by attaching targeting molecules called ubiquitins to the tumor suppressor, the team reported this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Online Early Edition.

The enzyme target, Brk, is shown to be an accelerator of HER2-positive tumors

Tumor cells in a particular subset of breast cancer patients churn out too much of a protein called ErbB2 -- also often called HER2 -- which drives the cells to proliferate unchecked. Patients unlucky enough to be in this group -- about one in four -- have poorer prognoses and clinical outcomes than those who don't.

The drugs Herceptin and Lapatinib, prescribed in combination with other chemotherapeutic agents, have improved this picture significantly, but leave plenty of room for improvement: they suppress ErbB2 but are effective against less than half of ErbB2-producing tumors. Moreover, patients with tumors that do respond usually develop resistance to these drugs.

Australian scientists have identified a way to 'switch off' a molecule, a key player in the molecular processes that trigger breast cancer and certain forms of leukaemiaterm.

The molecule, known as Gab2, operates downstream of a major breast cancer oncogene, HER2, the target of the drug Herceptin.

A research team from the Garvan Institute of Medical Research, led by Professor Roger Daly, has found a novel way of blocking signals to and from Gab2, preventing it from fulfilling its role in cell proliferation. The finding is published online today in the EMBO Journal.

In 2002, Professor Daly identified the important role of Gab2 in breast cancer. His task since then has been to work out exactly how Gab2 functions, and how to stop it.