Differential expression of Ets-1 in breast cancer among North Indian population.

ABSTRACT

Breast cancer is a highly aggressive disease contributing to high mortality rate among females across the globe owing to wide geographical variations, change in lifestyle along with rapid tumor growth, drug resistance, and high metastasis rate. To understand the molecular and genetic basis of breast cancer progression; we studied the role of E26 transformation-specific-1 (Ets-1) transcription factor which is implicated to have a role in carcinogenesis like invasion, metastasis, angiogenesis, etc. Our findings revealed an overexpression of Ets-1 gene in 75 breast cancer tumors as compared with their normal adjacent tissues. The findings significantly established a co-relation between Ets-1 expression in breast cancer tissue with hormonal receptor profiles and ductal-lobular histological subtypes in Indian population. In addition, a differential expression pattern of Ets-1 was observed between high, moderate, and low grades of breast cancer patients. The present study demonstrates a crucial role of Ets-1 transcription factor which may serve as a potential biomarker for breast carcinogenesis.