BACKGROUND Myelin is critical for efficient axonal conduction in the vertebrate nervous system. Neuregulin (Nrg) ligands and their ErbB receptors are required for the development of Schwann cells, the glial cells that form myelin in the peripheral nervous system. Previous studies have not determined whether Nrg-ErbB signaling is essential in vivo for Schwann cell fate specification, proliferati...

Diagnosis of metastatic breast cancer is associated with a very poor prognosis. New therapeutic targets are urgently needed, but their development is hampered by a lack of understanding of the mechanisms leading to tumor metastasis. Exemplifying this is the fact that the approximately 30% of all breast cancers overexpressing the receptor tyrosine kinase ErbB-2 are characterized by high metastat...

While the small GTPase Rac1 and its effectors are well-established mediators of mitogenic and motile signaling by tyrosine kinase receptors and have been implicated in breast tumorigenesis, little is known regarding the exchange factors (Rac-GEFs) that mediate ErbB receptor responses. Here, we identify the PIP(3)-Gβγ-dependent Rac-GEF P-Rex1 as an essential mediator of Rac1 activation, motility...

Approximately 5-10% of metastatic colorectal cancers harbor a BRAF-V600E mutation, which is correlated with resistance to EGFR-targeted therapies and worse clinical outcome. Vice versa, targeted inhibition of BRAF-V600E with the selective inhibitor PLX 4032 (Vemurafenib) is severely limited due to feedback re-activation of EGFR in these tumors. Mounting evidence indicates that upregulation of t...

The heregulin receptor tyrosine kinase ErbB-4 is constitutively cleaved, in the presence or absence of ligand, by an exofacial proteolytic activity producing a membrane-anchored cytoplasmic domain fragment of 80 kD. Based on selective sensitivity to inhibitors, the proteolytic activity is identified as that of a metalloprotease. The 80-kD product is tyrosine phosphorylated and retains tyrosine ...

From a human genomic library, we obtained six v-erbB-related DNA clones. A DNA probe prepared from one of the clones, lambda 107, hybridized to EcoRI fragments of 6.4 and 13 kilobase pairs of human DNA. Neither of these fragments was amplified in A431 vulva carcinoma cells, in which the gene encoding the epidermal growth factor receptor is amplified. In addition, the probe from lambda 107 hybri...

Purpose: Breast cancer is the second leading cause of cancer mortality among women worldwide. The major problem with current treatments is tumor resistance, recurrence, and disease progression. ErbB-2–positive breast tumors are aggressive and frequently become resistant to trastuzumab or lapatinib. We showed previously that Notch-1 is required for trastuzumab resistance in ErbB-2–positive breas...

Eleven recently isolated erbB-transducing viruses as well as avian erythroblastosis virus (AEV)-R (ES4) and AEV-H have been characterized for the type of disease they cause, their ability to transform fibroblasts in culture, their ability to cause disease in pedigrees of chicken that differ in susceptibility to erbB-induced erythroblastosis, and the structure of their erbB genes. Differences in...

Amplification and overexpression of the c-erbB-2 oncogene are of prognostic significance in human breast cancer. Overexpression of c-erbB-2 is the result of gene amplification. However, increased transcript levels of c-erbB-2 are also detected in the absence of gene amplification. In this study for the detection of the overexpression mRNA in situ hybridisation (ISH) and immunohistochemistry (IH...

A high percentage of human breast and ovarian tumors display amplified c-erbB-2 gene copies, leading to overexpression of the growth factor receptor. Its membrane location and elevated expression make the erbB-2 protein an appropriate target for a directed tumor therapy. We have used recombinant DNA technology to produce a single-chain antibody-exotoxin A (scFv-ETA) fusion protein which specifi...