β4 Integrin subunit gene expression correlates with tumor size and nuclear grade in early breast cancer

Leslie K. Diaz, Massimo Cristofanilli, Xiao Zhou, Kristin L. Welch, Terry L. Smith, Ying Yang, Nour Sneige, Aysegul A. Sahin, Michael Z. Gilcrease*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

63 Scopus citations

Abstract

In vitro data support a role for the α6β4 integrin in tumor cell migration and invasion, particularly in breast carcinoma cells, but clinical data on this potentially important integrin are limited. The β4 integrin subunit has been shown to cluster with genes characteristic of basal/myoepithelial cells in cDNA microarray analyses of breast cancer, and the subset of breast cancers with increased expression of genes characteristic of basal/ myoepithelial cells appears to be particularly aggressive. The purpose of this study was to determine whether α6β4 integrin expression correlates with aggressive clinicopathologic features of breast cancer and whether expression of this integrin has prognostic significance in early breast cancer. We evaluated tumor expression of the β4 integrin subunit gene in a cohort of patients with early invasive breast carcinoma by in situ hybridization and correlated expression levels with multiple clinicopathologic characteristics. We also evaluated expression of laminin-5 protein, the principal ligand of α6β4, in this patient cohort. Although we observed a slight trend towards decreased disease-free survival for patients whose tumors had high β4 gene expression and coexpression of laminin-5, this did not reach statistical significance (P = 0.11). However, we did observe a correlation between β4 mRNA expression and both tumor size (P = 0.01) and tumor nuclear grade (P < 0.01). These results do not demonstrate prognostic significance for β4 gene expression and/or laminin-5 protein expression in early breast cancer, but increased β4 gene expression in larger tumors and in higher grade tumors does support a potential role for the α6β4 integrin in tumor progression.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)1165-1175
Number of pages11
JournalModern Pathology
Volume18
Issue number9
DOIs
StatePublished - Sep 2005

Keywords

  • In situ hybridization
  • Laminin-5
  • α6β4 integrin

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • General Medicine

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