• The Breast Cancer and the Environment Research Center
• Genomic Basis of Reproductive History in Breast Cancer
• Breast Cancer Therapy by Differentiation Gene Activation
• Estrogens and Breast Cancer
• Biomarkers of Exposure
• Biomarkers of Breast Cancer Prevention
• Epigenetics Control of Estrogen Induced Cell Transformation
• Prevention Trial in the use of r-hCG in Women of High Risk of Developing Breast Cancer
• Circadian Rhythm and Mammary Gland Development
• Fox Chase Cancer Center Breast Cancer Tissue Resources
• Characterization and Validation of Genomic Expression Signature of Pregnancy

Genomic Basis of Reproductive History in Breast Cancer

The major goals of this project are:

1. To characterize the specific gene expression profile of women at "low" and "high" risk of developing breast cancer due of reproductive history.
2. To determine if gene clusters differentially expressed in women at risk of developing breast cancer due to reproductive history are also differentially expressed in the breast tissue of postmenopausal women with breast cancer, and to examine these clusters in comparison to postmenopausal women who do not have breast cancer.

The collection of the normal breast tissue was made possible by a collaboration with Dr. Emily Penman and Dr. Nicholas J. Petrelli, from the Helen F. Graham Cancer Center, Christiana Care Health System, Newark, Delaware; Dr. Angela Lanfranchi from Somerset Medical Center, Somerville, New Jersey; Dr. Kathryn Evers from the Diagnostic Imaging, American Oncology Hospital, Fox Chase Cancer Center, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Related Publications

1. Balogh, G.A. Heulings, R., Mailo, D.A., Russo, P.A., Sheriff, F., Russo, I.H., Moral, R., and Russo, J. Genomic Signature Induced by Pregnancy in the Human Breast. Int. J. Oncology 28:399-410, 2006.
2. Russo, J. Balogh, Heulings, R., Mailo, D.A., Moral, R., Russo, P.A., Sheriff, F., Vanegas, J. and Russo, I.H. Molecular basis of pregnancy induced breast cancer protection. European Journal of Cancer Prevention. 15:306-342, 2006.
3. Russo, I.H., and Russo, J. Primary prevention of breast cancer by hormone-induced differentiation. In: Cancer Prevention (Eds: H-J, Senn and U. Kapp). Springer, Heidelberg, 2007. Pp111-130.
4. Russo, J., Balogh, G., Mailo, D., Russo, P.A., Heulings, R., and Russo, IH. The genomic signature of breast cancer prevention. In: Cancer Prevention (Eds: H-J, Senn and U. Kapp). Springer, Heidelberg, 2007. Pp111-150.
5. Russo, J., Balogh, G., and Russo, I.H. Breast Cancer Prevention. Climacteric, 10: (Suppl 2) 47 53, 2007.
6. Balogh G.A., Heulings R., Russo I.H., Mailo D, Li Y-S and Russo, J., .Methodological approach to study the genomic profile of the human breast. International Journal of Oncology 31:253-260, 2007.
7. Balogh G. A., Russo I. H., Spittle C., Heulings R., and Russo J. Immune surveillance and programmed cell death related genes are significantly over expressed in the normal breast epithelium of postmenopausal parous women. International Journal of Oncology 31:303-312, 2007.
8. Balogh, G.A., Russo, J., Mailo,D.A., Heulings, R., Russo, P.A., Morrison, P. Sheriff, F., And Russo,I.H. The breast of parous women without cancer has a different genomic profile than those with cancer. Int J. Oncology 31:1165-1175, 2007.
9. Russo, J., Balogh, G.A., and Russo IH. Full term pregnancy induces a specific genomic signature in the human breast. Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers and Prevention (In Press) 2007.