In Breast Cancer: Cellular and Molecular Biology [Kluwer Academic Pub­ lishers, 1988], we tried to present an introduction to the emerging basic studies on steroid receptors, oncogenes, and growth factors in the regulation of normal and malignant mammary epithelium. The response to this volume was superb, indicating a tremendous interest in basic growth regulatory mechanisms governing breast cancer and controlling its malignant progres­ sion. In the two years since its publication, much new and exciting in­ formation has been published and the full interplay of regulatory mechanisms is now beginning to emerge. We have divided this book into four sections that we hope will unify important concepts and help to crystallize areas of consensus and/or disagreement among a diverse group of basic and clinical scientists working on the disease. The first section is devoted to studies on oncogenes, antioncogenes, proliferation, and tumor prognosis. The first chapter, by Sunderland and McGuire, introduces the characteristics of breast cancer as studied by patho­ logists to establish prognostic outcome. Of particular interest is a new proto­ oncogene called HER-2 (or neu), which is rapidly becoming accepted as a valuable new tumor marker of poor prognosis. The second chapter, by Lee Bookstein and Lee, introduces the best known antioncogene, the retinoblas­ toma antioncogene, whose expression is sometimes lost in breast cancer. Malignant progression appears to be influenced by the balance of proto­ oncogene and antioncogene expression.

Springer Book Archives

I. Oncogenes, antioncogenes, and tumor prognosis.- 1. Oncogenes as clinical prognostic indicators.- 2. Role of the retinoblastoma gene in the oncogenesis of human breast carcinoma.- II. Growth factors and their receptors.- 3. Relationship of growth factors and differentiation in normal and neoplastic development of the mammary gland.- 4. Local effects of growth factors.- 5. The insulin-like growth factors, their receptors, and their binding proteins in human breast cancer.- 6. The role of ras gene expression and transforming growth factor ? production in the etiology and progression of rodent and human breast cancer.- 7. The role of epidermal growth factor receptors in breast cancer.- 8. Cell proliferation in metazoans: Negative control mechanisms.- III. Estrogen and antiestrogens.- 9. Steroid modulation of the expression of growth factors and oncogenes in breast cancer.- 10. Antiestrogen therapy for breast cancer: Current strategies and potential causes for therapeutic failure.- 11. Steroidal pure antiestrogens.- 12. Estrogen-regulated messenger RNAs in human breast cancer cells.- 13. Estrogen and progesterone receptors.- 14. Growth factors as mediators of estrogen/antiestrogen action in human breast cancer cells.- 15. Steroids, growth factors, and cell cycle controls in breast cancer.- IV. Stromal-epithelial interactions and metastases.- 16. Stromal regulation of epithelial function.- 17. Mammary epithelial cells, extracellular matrix, and gene expression.- 18. Tenascin in mammary gland development: From embryogenesis to carcinogenesis.- 19. Stromal-epithelial interactions in normal and neoplastic mammary gland.- 20. Extracellular matrix metalloproteinases in tumor invasion and metastasis.