BACKGROUND Although chemopreventative agents targeting the estrogen/estrogen receptor (ER) pathway have been effective for ER+ breast cancers, prevention of hormone receptor-negative breast cancers, such as Her2/erbB-2+ breast cancers, remains a significant issue. Previous studies have demonstrated that administration of EGFR/erbB-2-targeting lapatinib to MMTV-erbB-2 transgenic mice inhibited m...

BACKGROUND The ErbB receptor tyrosine kinases are major contributors to malignant transformation. These receptors are frequently overexpressed in a variety of human carcinomas. The role of the ErbB receptors and their ligands in carcinomas and the mechanism by which their overexpression leads to cancer development is still unclear. Ligand binding to specific ErbB receptor is followed by recepto...

A new human breast cancer cell line (SUM-52PE), originating from a malignant pleural effusion specimen, that can be cultured under serum-free conditions has been isolated. Experiments were conducted to examine the relationship between expression of the erbB family of growth factor receptors and growth regulation in these cells. SUM-52PE cells are epidermal growth factor receptor negative but ex...

The ErbB family of receptors is overexpressed in numerous human tumors. Overexpression correlates with poor prognosis and resistance to therapy. Use of ErbB-specific antibodies to the receptors (Herceptin or Erbitux) or ErbB-specific small-molecule inhibitors of the receptor tyrosine kinase activity (Iressa or Tarceva) has shown clinical efficacy in several solid tumors. An alternative method o...

ErbB-2/HER2 drives epithelial malignancies by forming heterodimers with growth factor receptors. The primordial invertebrate receptor is sorted to the basolateral epithelial surface by binding of the PDZ domain of Lin-7 to the receptor's tail. We show that all four human ErbBs are basolaterally expressed, even when the tail motif is absent. Mutagenesis of hLin-7 unveiled a second domain, KID, t...

In cancer, vulnerable breast epithelium malignance tendency correlates with number and activation of ErbB receptor tyrosine kinases. In the presented work, we observe ErbB receptors activated by irradiation-induced DNA injury or neuregulin- 1 β application, or alternatively, attenuated by a therapeutic antibody using high resolution fluorescence localization microscopy. The gap junction turnove...

Overexpression or mutation of ErbB receptors is correlated with incidence of various kinds of human cancers [1]. On the other hand, co-expression of ErbB4 receptor is related to better prognosis and non-metastatic cancer phenotypes [2]. An earlier study demonstrated that one of characteristics of prostate cancer is a lack of ErbB4 receptor expression while ErbB4 is expressed widely in other typ...

Neuregulin1-ErbB signaling is important for various functions during Schwann cell development and myelination. Activation of the ErbB receptors also triggers myelin breakdown in mature myelinating Schwann cells. The mechanism by which the activated ErbB receptor complex elicits multiple biological functions in Schwann cells is unclear. In Charcot-Marie-Tooth (CMT) disease-the most common demyel...

GW572016 (Lapatinib) is a tyrosine kinase inhibitor in clinical development for cancer that is a potent dual inhibitor of epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR, ErbB-1) and ErbB-2. We determined the crystal structure of EGFR bound to GW572016. The compound is bound to an inactive-like conformation of EGFR that is very different from the active-like structure bound by the selective EGFR inhibit...