title: Science SignalingPodcast for 21 February 2017: Pentraxin-3 in basal-like breast cancer.
abstract: This Podcast features an interview with Antoine Karnoub, senior author of a Research Article that appears in the 21 February 2017 issue ofScience Signaling, about how pentraxin-3 (PTX3) links increased phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI3K) signaling to stem cell properties in basal-like breast cancer (BLBC). BLBC is an aggressive type of breast cancer in which the tumor cells exhibit increased PI3K signaling and have stem cell-like properties. Thomaset alfound that aberrant PI3K signaling in BLBCs stimulated the expression ofPTX3, which encodes a protein that functions in innate immunity. PTX3 promoted stem cell-like traits in mammary epithelial cells and stimulated the growth of breast cancer cells. Conversely, decreasing the abundance of PTX3 in breast cancer cells reduced both the growth of these cells and their expression of stem cell markers. The abundance ofPTX3transcripts in breast tumors negatively correlated with patient survival, suggesting thatPTX3may be a useful biomarker for stratifying BLBC patients and that targeting PTX3 may suppress tumor growth in some BLBC patients.Listen to Podcast.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pathology and Cancer Center, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02215, USA.|Harvard Stem Cell Institute, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA.|Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA 02142, USA.
authors.forename: Antoine E
authors.initials: AE
authors.lastname: Karnoub
authors.affiliation: Associate Editor, Science Signaling, American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1200 New York Avenue, NW, Washington, DC 20005, USA.
authors.forename: Annalisa M
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: VanHook
mesh_terms: D001943:Breast Neoplasms; D002097:C-Reactive Protein; D006801:Humans; D058539:Phosphatidylinositol 3-Kinase; D019869:Phosphatidylinositol 3-Kinases; D015398:Signal Transduction; D013234:Stem Cells
chemical_list: D002097:C-Reactive Protein; D019869:Phosphatidylinositol 3-Kinases; D058539:Phosphatidylinositol 3-Kinase