A second breast cancer susceptibility gene is found
Marx, J.
Science 271(5245): 30-31
1996
ISSN/ISBN: 0036-8075 PMID: 8539592 Document Number: 463018
A large international team has discovered a second breast cancer susceptibility gene, called BRAC2. According to Francis Collins, director of the National Center for Human Genome Research at the National Institutes of Health, it may account for the majority of the familial breast cancer pedigrees that did not turn out to be caused by the first breast cancer susceptibility gene, BRAC1. Researchers are hopeful that both genes will afford insight into the biochemical changes that induce the development of breast cancer in the first place. Many questions remain, however; no one knows what the normal functions of the genes are or how their loss or mutation might lead to cancer. It is also unclear what roles the genes play in the development of the great majority of breast cancers that are apparently not hereditary but "sporadic.".