Co-expression and prognostic value of gross cystic disease fluid protein 15 and mammaglobin in primary breast cancer

Gross cystic disease fluid protein (GCDFP- 15) and mammaglobin are both widely used and accepted markers for epithelia of breast origin. We aimed to evaluate their relation of expression on parallel whole tissue sections in primary breast cancer by immunohistochemistry and also to correlate it with clinico-pathological parameters including patient survival. Primary breast carcinomas from 165 patients with a mean clinical follow-up of 73 months were immunostained using commercially available antibodies against GCDFP-15 and mammaglobin. An immunoreactive score (IRS) was calculated based on the cytoplasmic staining intensity and the number of cells stained. Cytoplasmic expression of GCDFP-15 and mammaglobin was observed in 73.3% and 72.1% of invasive breast carcinomas respectively. 91.8% of breast cancer cases expressed at least one of both markers. Both markers strongly correlated with each other and were significantly associated with lower tumour grading. Additionally, GCDFP-15 negativity was significantly associated with shortened disease-free survival times in univariate and multivariate analyses. We demonstrated the strong correlation of GCDFP-15 and mammaglobin with each other and showed that only very few primary breast cancers are completely negative for both markers. The significantly longer disease free survival times for patients with GCDFP-15 positive tumours clearly warrants further study

A defined chromosome 6q fragment (at D6S310) harbors a putative tumor suppressor gene for breast cancer

Recent evidence obtained by cytogenetic and molecular studies indicates that in breast cancer chromosome 6q is often affected by genetic changes suggesting the existence of putative tumor suppressor genes (TSGs). However the function of gene(s) on this chromosome in breast cancer suppression is not understood. To substantiate further the presence of breast cancer related TSGs at 6q and to define their location, we first performed microcell-mediated transfer of chromosome 6 to CAL51 breast cancer cells for studying possible suppression of malignant phenotype and secondly, we analysed DNAs from 46 primary breast cancers for loss of constitutive heterozygosity (LOH) using 24 poly-morphic microsatellite markers. The chromosome transfer resulted in loss of tumorigenicity and reversion of other neoplastic properties of the microcell hybrids. Polymorphism analysis of single hybrids revealed that they harbored only a small donor chromosome fragment defined by the marker D6S310 (6q23.3-q25) and flanked by D6S292 and D6S311. The LOH data suggest that four tumor suppressor gene loci mapped to the central and distal portion of 6q may be independently deleted in breast cancer. One of these regions corresponds to the region identified by chromosome transfer