Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2011 Aug 30;9(1):58-64.
doi: 10.1038/nrclinonc.2011.125.

Challenges translating breast cancer gene signatures into the clinic

Britta Weigelt  1 , Lajos Pusztai, Alan Ashworth, Jorge S Reis-Filho
Affiliations

Challenges translating breast cancer gene signatures into the clinic

Britta Weigelt et al. Nat Rev Clin Oncol. .

Abstract

The advent of microarray-based gene-expression profiling a decade ago raised high expectations for rapid advances in breast cancer classification, prognostication and prediction. Despite the development of molecular classifications, and prognostic and predictive gene-expression signatures, microarray-based studies have not yielded definitive answers to many of the questions that remain germane for the successful implementation of personalized medicine. There are a lack of robust signatures to predict benefit from specific therapeutic agents and it is still not possible to predict prognosis or chemotherapy treatment response in specific disease subsets accurately, such as triple-negative breast cancer. We discuss the hurdles in the development and validation of molecular classification systems, and prognostic and predictive signatures based on microarray gene-expression profiling. We suggest that similar challenges are likely to be encountered in translating next-generation sequencing data into clinically useful information. Finally we highlight strategies for the development of clinically useful molecular predictors in the future.

PubMed Disclaimer

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. Lancet Oncol. 2009 Nov;10(11):1070-6 - PubMed
    1. Oncogene. 2010 Oct 14;29(41):5545-55 - PubMed
    1. Cold Spring Harb Perspect Biol. 2010 Jul;2(7):a003327 - PubMed
    1. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2001 Sep 11;98(19):10869-74 - PubMed
    1. J Pathol. 2010 Jan;220(2):263-80 - PubMed

Publication types

Substances