Predictive role of HER2/neu, topoisomerase-II-alpha, and tissue inhibitor of metalloproteinases (TIMP-1) for response to adjuvant taxane-based chemotherapy in patients with intermediate-risk breast cancer: results from the WSG-AGO EC-Doc trial.

Taxane-anthracycline-based adjuvant chemotherapy is standard of care in patients with node-positive breast cancer (BC) but is also associated with severe side effects and significant costs. It is yet unclear, which biomarkers would predict benefit from taxanes and/or general chemoresistance. In this study, we investigate a large cohort of patients with intermediate-risk BC treated within the WSG EC-DOC Trial for the predictive impact of topoisomerase-II-alpha, HER2/neu, and TIMP-1.

Final analysis of the prospective WSG-AGO EC-Doc versus FEC phase III trial in intermediate-risk (pN1) early breast cancer: efficacy and predictive value of Ki67 expression.

Background: Taxane-based adjuvant chemotherapy is standard in node-positive (N+) early breast cancer (BC). The magnitude of benefit in intermediate-risk N+ early BC is still unclear. WSG-AGO epiribicine and cyclophosphamide (EC)-Doc is a large trial evaluating modern taxane-based chemotherapy in patients with 1-3 positive lymph nodes (LNs) only.

An activated ErbB3/NRG1 autocrine loop supports in vivo proliferation in ovarian cancer cells.

Ovarian cancer is a leading cause of death from gynecologic malignancies. Treatment for advanced-stage disease remains limited and, to date, targeted therapies have been incompletely explored. By systematically suppressing each human tyrosine kinase in ovarian cancer cell lines by RNAi, we found that an autocrine signal-transducing loop involving NRG1 and activated ErbB3 operates in a subset of primary ovarian cancers and ovarian cancer cell lines.

The reversal of multidrug resistance in multicellular tumor spheroids by SDZ PSC 833.

Multidrug resistance (MDR) is a major impediment to the effective treatment of cancer. We have used multicellular tumor spheroids (MTS) as a model to investigate whether MDR can be reversed in a three dimensional structure. MTS are tightly associated aggregates of tumor cells that exhibit many of the properties of solid tumors.