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• Evidence of VEGF expression

Evidence of VEGF expression in breast cancer

Gene expression of VEGF and other pro-angiogenic factors in paired breast carcinomas (Ca) and noncancerous breast tissue (N). Note the large difference in VEGF expression between cancerous tissue and normal tissue.¹²

Reprinted with permission from the American Association for Cancer Research. Yoshiji H, Gomez DE, Shibuya M, Thorgeirsson UP. Cancer Res. 1996;56:2013-2016.

VEGF: important across breast cancer tumor types

It has been shown that vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and angiogenesis are important to tumor growth and metastasis across a range of solid tumor types. This appears to be the case in many forms of breast cancer, including invasive/noninvasive, lymph node—negative/lymph node—positive, inflammatory breast cancer, and metastatic breast cancer.^2-5,10,11

In one study, Yoshiji and colleagues found that VEGF expression was markedly upregulated compared with surrounding normal tissue in each of the 18 human breast tissue samples evaluated.¹² In a separate study assessing the role of VEGF in breast cancer, Brown and researchers observed VEGF to be expressed at high levels in ductal carcinoma (comedo-type, invasive, and metastatic) but not in infiltrating lobular carcinoma.¹³ A third study, reported in 2006 by Jacobs and colleagues, showed that an increased risk of invasive breast cancer was correlated with 2 VEGF gene polymorphisms, VEGF-2578C and VEGF-1154G. These polymorphisms are both hypothesized to increase expression of VEGF.¹⁴

VEGF and angiogenesis in inflammatory breast cancer

Intense angiogenic activity has been observed in inflammatory breast cancer. In an attempt to characterize the angiogenic phenotype of this disease, Van der Auwera et al measured mRNA expression of tumor angiogenesis and lymphangiogenesis factors in patients with both inflammatory (n=16) and noninflammatory (n=20) breast cancer. Although both forms of the disease exhibited high levels of angiogenic activity, inflammatory breast cancer had significantly higher mRNA expression of angiogenic and lymphangiogenic genes, including those encoding for VEGF-C and VEGF-D. These observations may help clarify why inflammatory breast cancer has high metastatic potential via hematogenous and lymphatic routes.¹⁵

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