Scientists have completed the first-ever genetic mapping of tumor cells from Taiwanese with breast cancer in a potential breakthrough for treatment and prevention of the disease.
National Cancer Research Institute director Cha Tai-lung (查岱龍) said that the genetic flaws linked to breast cancer are passed down within subpopulations, complicating attempts to apply research conducted on one group to another.
People with Jewish heritage are more likely to develop breast cancer from mutations in BRCA1 and BRCA2 gene markers, a condition that is far less likely to develop in other ethnicities, Cha said.
Photo: CNA
East Asian women develop breast cancer at a younger age than people of European descent, institute assistant research fellow Chen Shang-hung (陳尚鴻) said, adding that and the most common age that Taiwanese women develop breast cancer is 45 to 55, 10 years younger than Caucasian women.
This means that breast cancer results in a greater economic burden on Taiwanese families and the healthcare system, but no genetic mapping of tumors had been done in the nation until now, Chen said.
Institute researchers used next-generation sequencing technology to map tumor tissue samples from 116 Taiwanese with breast cancer and compared the results with data from the New York-based Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, he said.
The research, “Comprehensive genomic profiling and therapeutic implications for Taiwanese patients with treatment-naive breast cancer” — which included the “domestic breast cancer gene variation map” — was published in the Cancer Medicine journal on June 19.
They found that mutations of seven genetic markers were common among Taiwanese breast cancer patients, a result broadly comparable, but not identical, to markers in Western patients, he said.
The discovery suggests that targeted therapy drugs would work on 40 percent of Taiwanese patients and opened new avenues of research on the cause of mammary cancer in the local population, he said.
If mutations of the genetic markers in Taiwanese are about the same as in Westerners, then other environmental, behavioral or unforeseen mechanisms must be at play for their younger age, Chen said.
The factors could be related to diet, cultural habits or an unknown genetic marker, he said.
Changes to mRNA or protein expression are from causes other than genetic mutations, and could spark cancer development and affect the severity of the disease, National Health Research Institutes secretary-general Hung Wen-Chun (洪文俊) said.
The institute would continue exploring the causes of breast cancer among Taiwanese, Hung said.
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