Claudine Isaacs

Payment for services (e.g., consulting fees, honoraria, paid authorship)

Collaborative Research in Integrative Cancer Biology

Breast tumors expressing estrogen receptor-alpha (ER) comprise 70% of all newly diagnosed invasive breast cancers. ER+ breast tumors represent the breast cancer subtype most strongly associated with tumor dormancy, conferring upon these patients a high risk of experiencing a late recurrence (emergence from dormancy) that can persist for decades after initial diagnosis and treatment. Unfortunately, very little is known abou the molecular drivers that determine the onset, maintenance, and emergence from dormancy. Our multidisciplinary team will apply state-of-the-art technologies to several unique, independent, human breast cancer data sets (including matched primary and recurrent tumors from the same individuals) and a rat mammary tumor model to address two fundamental aspects of dormancy; i.e., we will (i) accurately and robustly identify those breast cancer patients at greatest risk of experiencing a late recurrence (e 5 yrs after initial diagnosis) and (i) define the molecular events driving dormancy to help develop new treatment strategies that can be targeted to these patients.