The role of fibroblast growth factors and their receptors in breast cancer

Introduction: Breast cancer is the most common and the second leading cause of cancer death in women. Researches show that mutation, gene amplification and overexpression of growth factors especially fibroblast growth factors (FGFs) are the main reasons in development of cancers which are aggressive and almost resistant to treatments. 18 members of the FGF family have been identified in mammalian that are grouped into 6 subfamilies based on sequence homology and phylogeny. FGF receptors are the subfamily of tyrosine kinase receptors that are coding by 4 distinct gene and they are specified for tissues by alternative splicing. FGFs are involved in angiogenesis, embryonic development, wound healing, cell proliferation, cell differentiation and different signaling pathways. Methods: In this study, related articles were studied to provide an overview of changes in FGFs and their receptors in breast cancer. Results: The results showed that ectopic FGF signaling directly increases tumorprogression and angiogenesis. FGFs are activators of the metalloproteinases secreted by cancer cells and are essential factors in maintenance and enhancement of angiogenesis. FGF8b induces cell cycle and is expressed in more than 50% of breast cancer tumors. INT2 gene amplification has been observed in 22% of breast cancers that coded FGF3. FGFR-1 genomic region (8P11-12), is one of the areas which has the most amplification rate in breast cancer and its proliferation has been seen innearly 10% of breast cancer tumors. Conclusion: Genetic changes and over expression of FGFs and their receptors are affective in appearance of aggressive and resistant to treatments breast cancers.

کلیدواژه ها:

breast cancer ، fibroblast growth factors ، fibroblast growth factor receptors