Breast cancer investigators at the NYU Cancer Institute are focusing on five broad areas of study:

• Epidemiology and prevention: response, resistance, and metastasis of locally advanced breast cancer (LABC), a persistently under-studied form of breast cancer common among the medically underserved and a leading presentation of breast cancer worldwide 
• Hormone receptors and signaling pathways involved in breast cancer
• Invasiveness, metastasis, and the development of agents that inhibit angiogenesis (the development of blood vessels that a tumor needs to grow and spread)
• Tumor immunology:  induction of an immune response against a tumor using targeted radiation therapy
• Radiobiology and physics:  new approaches and uses for radiation treatment in breast cancer; expansion of the biological understanding of radiation-induced fibrosis and the molecular understanding of radiation's effects on normal and cancerous breast tissue

Specific avenues of study include:

Epidemiology and Prevention

• Protective role of pregnancy in maternal breast and ovarian cancers
• Role of polymorphisms in DNA repair pathways in the etiology of breast cancer
• Pituitary hormones, growth hormone, and prolactin in mammary gland development and breast cancer risk
• Novel biomarkers for the early detection of breast cancer
• Inflammatory responses and oxidative stress in breast cancer development
• Socio-cultural factors in care-seeking behavior and treatment for breast cancer
• Genetic and molecular markers for targeted treatment of LABC in New York women, with the goal of translating the Akt/mTOR pathway to treatment of LABC
• Adherence to treatment issues among breast cancer patients with LABC
• Fertility following breast cancer treatment

Hormone Receptors and Signal Transduction

• Role of nuclear hormone receptors in breast cancer
• Signal transduction and transcriptional regulation by ER, AR, and GR receptors
• Differential effects of ER-interacting proteins on ER activity
• Circulating estrogenic molecules and breast cancer risk
• Role of IGF-1 in breast cancer development and progression
• Breast cancer chemoprevention by SOM230, an IGF-1 action inhibitor

Invasiveness, Metastasis, and Angiogenesis: Extracellular Matrix (ECM) Studies

• Latent forms of TGF-β1 and TGF-β3 and their roles in invasion and metastasis
• ECM in breast cancer invasion and metastasis
• Non-proteolytic roles of proteinases in breast cancer cell proliferation and migration
• Mammary developmental changes in breast cancer invasiveness and metastasis
• Matrix remodeling in angiogenesis and breast cancer invasion
• Role of STAT3 in breast cancer progression
• Kinases and ubiquitylating enzymes in breast cancer, SWI/SNF in breast cancer development
• Cellular protein synthesis in breast cancer invasion and metastasis
• LABC angiogenesis and metastasis
• TGF-β1 and VEGF during angiogenesis
• Translational control and the mTOR pathway in breast cancer hypoxia, tumor progression, and angiogenesis
• New biomarkers for ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) invasion and LABC metastasis
• Cytologic characterization of breast lesion microinvasion
• Lymphadenectomy application in breast cancer and melanoma
• Breast tissue bank
• Cofactors of metastasis of large breast tumors
• Development of anti-angiogenic PTC299, a specific inhibitor of VEGF mRNA translation

Immunity and Tumor Immunology

• Radiation therapy to enhance the effectiveness of immunotherapy, chemoradiation, and tumor immunity
• STAT activation by janus kinases

Radiobiology and Physics Research

• TGF-β1 in post-radiation breast fibrosis
• Chemoradiation and LABC:  molecular and genetic markers to predict treatment response
• Radiation/chemotherapy resistance
• TAMs, tumor response to chemoradiation, and breast tumor progression