title: Gene expression patterns distinguish breast carcinomas from normal breast tissues: the Malaysian context.
abstract: Genomic and transcriptomic alterations that affect cellular processes, such as cell proliferation, differentiation, apoptosis and invasion, commonly occur in breast oncogenesis. Epidemiological evidence has proven that the risk of breast cancer predisposition varies among different ethnicities. This study aims to identify the transcriptome changes that commonly occur during the transition of normal breast epithelium to carcinoma in three local ethnic groups (Malays, Chinese and Indians). The gene expression patterns of 43 breast carcinomas with 43 patient-matched normal breast tissues were investigated using Affymetrix U133A GeneChip (containing 22,283 probe sets targeting approximately 18,400 different transcripts) and analyzed with GeneSpring GX10. Our findings revealed a total of 33 significantly differentially expressed genes, which showed>2-fold change at a 99.9% confidence interval level (p<0.001). The significantly differentially expressed genes included CD24, CD36, CD9, TACSTD1, TACSTD2, HBB, LEP, LPL, AKR1C1, AKR1C2 and AKR1C3. Our results indicate that the vast majority of gene expression changes, from normal breast epithelial to carcinoma, found in our three major ethnic populations are similar to those in the Caucasian population. Further study of the differentially expressed genes identified in our present study is needed to search for potential breast tumor biomarkers. This will eventually help to improve the therapeutic and treatment strategies for breast cancer patients in the future.
authors.affiliation: Haematology Unit, Cancer Research Centre, Institute for Medical Research, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. ivyna@imr.gov.my
authors.forename: Ivyna Bong
authors.initials: IB
authors.lastname: Pau Ni
authors.forename: Zubaidah
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Zakaria
authors.forename: Rohaizak
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Muhammad
authors.forename: Norlia
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Abdullah
authors.forename: Naqiyah
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Ibrahim
authors.forename: Nor
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Aina Emran
authors.forename: Nor
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Hisham Abdullah
authors.forename: Sharifah Noor Akmal
authors.initials: SN
authors.lastname: Syed Hussain
mesh_terms: D001940:Breast / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000473:pathology; D001943:Breast Neoplasms / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism / Q000473:pathology; D018270:Carcinoma, Ductal, Breast / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism / Q000473:pathology; D005260:Female; D020869:Gene Expression Profiling; D015972:Gene Expression Regulation, Neoplastic; D006801:Humans; D008296:Malaysia; D020411:Oligonucleotide Array Sequence Analysis; D012333:RNA, Messenger / Q000235:genetics; D020133:Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction
chemical_list: D012333:RNA, Messenger