Amplification of the HER-2/neu (ErbB2) gene is observed in approximately 30% of human breast cancers, correlating with a poor clinical prognosis. Src kinases are also involved in the etiology of breast cancer, and their activation was suggested to be necessary for Neu-induced oncogenesis. To address whether Src activity is essential for Neu-mediated tumorigenesis, we used a physiologic inhibito...

BACKGROUND Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is one of the most prevalent fatal cancers in the world. Despite advances in early diagnosis and improvements in surgical techniques, the survival of patients with HCC even after resection is poor because of the high incidence of recurrences. Therefore, the identification of prognostic factors may be helpful in the development of new treatment protocols...

BACKGROUND Expression of the HER-2/neu oncogene has been suggested to confer added virulence or aggressive behavior in gynecologic malignancies. The aim of this study is to determine the frequency of HER-2/neu expression in invasive cervical cancer and its impact on survival in women with cervical cancer. DESIGN Archival tissue from 150 patients with cervical carcinoma was evaluated immunohis...

PURPOSE The aim of this study was to efficiently design a novel vaccine for human Her-2/neu-positive (hHer-2/neu) breast cancer using the live, attenuated bacterial vector Listeria monocytogenes. EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN Three recombinant L. monocytogenes-based vaccines were generated that could express and secrete extracellular and intracellular fragments of the hHer-2/neu protein. In addition, w...

PURPOSE Many studies suggest that Her2/neu play an important role in neoadjuvant endocrine therapy. This study aimed to determine whether the level of Her2/neu expression in advanced breast cancer changes after antiaromatase neoadjuvant treatment, as well as to identify the relationship between Her2/neu expression and response to this kind of therapy. EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN Thirty-six postmenopa...

Overexpression of Her2/neu is implicated in the development of resistance to the antiestrogen tamoxifen (TAM) that exerts its inhibitory effect through interaction with estrogen receptor (ER). Whereas Her2/neu and ER are believed to be important cell survival/death factors in human breast cancer cells, if and how they interact to confer resistance to hormone therapy is not known. This prompted ...

PURPOSE Discover the anti-neoplastic efficacy of epirubicin-(C13-imino)-[anti-HER2/neu] against chemotherapeutic-resistant SKBr-3 mammary carcinoma and delineate the capacity of selenium to enhance it's cytotoxic anti-neoplastic potency. METHODS In molar excess, EMCH was combined with epirubicin to create a covalent epirubicin-(C13-imino)-EMCH-maleimide intermediate with sulfhydryl-reactive p...

The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of a small interfering RNA (siRNA) targeting human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2/neu) on the proliferation and viability of prostate cancer PC-3M cells. Chemically synthesized siRNA targeting HER2/neu was transfected into PC-3M cells by using liposomes, and cells transfected with empty liposomes, a negative siRNA sequence, or nothin...

To investigate whether overexpression of the neu protein in breast tumors differentiates risk factor patterns for breast cancer, neu protein overexpression was determined in 296 breast carcinomas of patients participating in an ongoing population-based case-control study. Risk factor information on these patients and 737 controls was obtained during home interviews. Most breast cancer risk fact...

The clinical role of HER-2/neu, a 185 kD epithelial transmembranous protein, has evolved after the approval of the anti-HER-2/neu targeted monoclonal antibody trastuzumab (Herceptin) for the therapy of metastatic breast cancer. The extracellular domain of HER-2/neu undergoes proteolytic cleavage from the full-length protein by metalloproteases, and is shed into the blood as a circulating antige...