The breast cancer susceptibility genes 1 (BRCA1) and 2 (BRCA2) are cellular proteins involved in DNA repair. They are normally expressed in the breast, ovaries, prostate, and other tissues. Their germline mutation is the cause of hereditary breast-ovarian cancer syndromes. BRCA mutation carriers are also susceptible to other cancers, notably prostate cancer. In this article, we review the role ...

ix Chapter I: Introduction DNA DAMAGE RESPONSE 1 DNA DAMAGE REPAIR DNA modifications 3 Repair of double stranded DNA breaks 7 DNA DAMAGE RESPONSE PATHWAYS AND CANCER The link between the FA/BRCA pathway and cancer 8 The FA/BRCA pathway DNA damage response 11 FA/BRCA proteins and DNA damage repair 14 FA/BRCA proteins and cell cycle checkpoint 17 The link between the Mismatch repair pathway and c...

The interest in indentifying novel biomarkers for early stage breast cancer (BRCA) detection has become grown significantly in recent years. From a view of network biology, one of the emerging themes today is to re-characterize a protein's biological functions in its molecular network. Although many methods have been presented, including network-based gene ranking for molecular biomarker discov...

Breast cancer (BrCa) is one of the most frequently diagnosed cancers and the second leading cause of cancerrelated deaths in North American women. Most deaths are caused by metastasis, and BrCa is characterized by a distinct metastatic pattern involving lymph nodes, bone marrow, lung, liver and brain. Migration of metastatic cells share many similarities with leukocyte trafficking, which are re...

Currently available scientific evidence erroneously suggests that mutagenic weakness or loss of the BRCA1/2 genes may liberate the proliferative effects of estrogen signaling, which provokes DNA damage and genomic instability. Conversely, BRCA mutation seems to be an imbalanced defect, crudely inhibiting the upregulation of estrogen receptor expression and liganded transcriptional activity, whe...

PURPOSE Shift work, short sleep duration, employment as a flight attendant, and exposure to light at night, all potential causes of circadian disruption, have been inconsistently associated with breast cancer (BrCA) risk. The aim of this meta-analysis is to quantitatively evaluate the combined and independent effects of exposure to different sources of circadian disruption on BrCA risk in women...

BACKGROUND Soy intake is associated with a lower risk of breast cancer. However, it is unclear whether the same reduction in risk associated with high soy intake is also applicable to familial or genetic breast cancer. OBJECTIVE The aim of this study was to assess the dietary factors among carriers and noncarriers of BRCA mutations in the Korean Hereditary Breast Cancer Study (KOHBRA). DESI...

Ovarian cancer (OC) mostly arises sporadically, but a fraction of cases are associated with mutations in BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes. The presence of a BRCA mutation in OC patients has been suggested as a prognostic and predictive factor. In addition, the identification of asymptomatic carriers of such mutations offers an unprecedented opportunity for OC prevention. This review is aimed at exploring ...

As next-generation sequencing increases access to human genetic variation, the challenge of determining clinical significance of variants becomes ever more acute. Germline variants in the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes can confer substantial lifetime risk of breast and ovarian cancer. Assessment of variant pathogenicity is a vital part of clinical genetic testing for these genes. A database of clinical ...