Cancer-Causing Protein Strongly Tied to Hormone Resistance in Breast Cancer

2011 NOV 24 -- In dozens of experiments in mice and in human cancer cells, a team of Johns Hopkins scientists has closely tied production of a cancer-causing protein called TWIST to the development of estrogen resistance in women with breast cancer. Because estrogen fuels much breast cancer growth, such resistance - in which cancers go from estrogen positive to estrogen negative status - can sabotage anticancer drugs that work to block estrogen and prevent disease recurrence after surgery. Estrogen resistance develops in over half of women taking estrogen-blocking medications, such as tamoxifen, and exists from the start in many other women.

The Johns...

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