Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
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Query: UMLS:C0376358 (prostate cancer)
 59,338 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Not since the discovery of p53 has another molecule received as much attention as PTEN. In the 5 years since the discovery of PTEN, encoding a dual specificity phosphatase tumor suppressor on 10q23, it has been shown to be a susceptibility gene for an inherited cancer syndrome, Cowden syndrome, and for several developmental disorders; it has been shown to play a prominent role in normal murine and human development; and it has been shown to be instrumental in cell cycle arrest, apoptosis, and/or possibly cell migration and cytoskeletal affairs. Initial work on cancer cell lines had suggested that PTEN caused every type of cancer because it was reported that a relatively high frequency of a variety of cancer cell lines, whether derived from solid tumors or hematological malignancies, had homozygous or compound heterozygous genetic alterations involving PTEN. Such data, together with the germ-line human and murine model data, suggested that PTEN mutations occurred "early" in sporadic tumorigenesis. However, subsequent painstaking work in noncultured primary tumors and in careful in vitro overexpression studies over the last 4 years demonstrated that the mechanism of PTEN inactivation can be varied and might be cell type dependent. Furthermore, apart from sporadic endometrial carcinoma, PTEN alteration in noncultured sporadic neoplasias likely occurs "late," promoting progression and metastasis. The article by Davies et al. (Clin Cancer Res., 8: 1904-1914, 2002) sheds light on all of these issues when they report on data that derive from a "triple threat" strategy, i.e., in vitro, in vivo, and ex vivo, to demonstrate that adenoviral infection of PTEN into PTEN-null PC3 prostate cancer cell lines results in decreased metastatic potential without significantly altering tumor size via the predominant mechanism of G(1) cell cycle arrest but not apoptosis.
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PMID:The expanding role of PTEN in neoplasia: a molecule for all seasons? Commentary re: M. A. Davies, et al., Adenoviral-mediated expression of MMAC/PTEN inhibits proliferation and metastasis of human prostate cancer cells. Clin. Cancer Res., 8: 1904-1914, 2002. 1206 Jun 35

Breast cancer in men is a rare disease, accounting for approximately 1% of all breast cancer cases. Although the epidemiologic literature regarding female breast cancer is extensive, relatively little is known about the etiology of male breast cancer (MBC). This review is intended to summarize the existing body of evidence on genetic and epidemiologic risk factors for breast cancer in men. Overall, the epidemiology of MBC presents similarities with the epidemiology of female breast cancer. Major genetic factors associated with an increased risk of breast cancer for men include BRCA2 mutations, which are believed to account for the majority of inherited breast cancer in men, Klinefelter syndrome, and a positive family history. Suspected genetic factors include AR gene mutations, CYP17 polymorphism, Cowden syndrome, and CHEK2. Epidemiologic risk factors for MBC include disorders relating to hormonal imbalances, such as obesity, testicular disorders (e.g., cryptorchidism, mumps orchitis, and orchiectomy), and radiation exposure. Suspected epidemiologic risk factors include prostate cancer,prostate cancer treatment, gynecomastia, occupational exposures (e.g., electromagnetic fields, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, and high temperatures), dietary factors (e.g., meat intake and fruit and vegetable consumption), and alcohol intake.
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PMID:Epidemiology of male breast cancer. 1566 71

PTEN is a tumor suppressor gene localized to human chromosome 10q23.31, a genomic region frequently lost in glioblastoma and prostate cancer. The fact that PTEN encodes a lipid phosphatase with specificity towards phosphatidylinositol-3,4,5-triphosphate renders it a gate-keeper of the phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase pathway. Numerous physiological processes have been ascribed to this evolutionarily conserved molecule including proliferation, cell size determination, survival, differentiation, and cell fate specification. Indeed, mutation in PTEN gene is the genetic cause of Cowden Syndrome. Structurally, the 54-kilodalton protein is composed of two major functional domains crucial for catalytic and membrane binding functions. Additional regulatory regions in both amino- and carboxyl-termini further dictate its structural integrity, catalytic activity, and subcellular localization. Extensive characterization of PTEN primary coding sequence has revealed a multitude of post-translational modifications that fine-tune its biochemical properties. These include phosphorylation, ubiquitination, redox modifications, and acetylation. This article aims to provide an in-depth review of the diverse post-translational modifications of PTEN, focusing on their biological relevance in both normal and cancer cells. The potential applications to cancer therapy by modulating the post-translational modifications of PTEN will also be discussed.
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PMID:Post-translational modifications of PTEN and their potential therapeutic implications. 2148 23

Prostate cancer and breast cancer are the most common malignancies in the western world. Androgen receptor (AR) and PTEN both have been well documented to have important roles in prostate carcinogenesis. In contrast, AR and PTEN in breast carcinogenesis have not been well studied. Furthermore, the crosstalk and connection between those two pathways remain unclear. Increased AR expression in prostate cancers, combined with decreased PTEN expression, portends a poor clinical outcome. Paradoxically, both high AR and high PTEN levels, detected by immunohistochemistry, in primary breast carcinomas have been associated with better disease-free survival. Here, we performed in silico analysis of publicly available microarray data sets from prostate or breast carcinomas. We found an inverse correlation between AR and PTEN transcript expression in prostate cancer tissues in contrast to the positive correlation in breast cancer. These data led us to hypothesize that AR may directly affect PTEN transcriptional regulation in prostate and breast cancer cells. Here, we show for the first time that AR inhibits PTEN transcription in prostate cancer cells, whereas AR upregulates PTEN transcription in breast cancer cells, which mechanistically explains both the immunohistochemical PTEN-AR expressional data noted in clinical trials and in our in silico analysis of the transcriptomes of breast and prostate cancers. In addition, we have fine-mapped the AR-binding motif within the PTEN promoter. Here we show that, in patients with Cowden syndrome, an inherited cancer syndrome caused by germline mutations scattered throughout PTEN, point variants affecting the 3' end of the AR-binding motif result in abrogation of androgen-mediated transcriptional regulation of PTEN expression. We may speculate that the differential AR effect on PTEN may begin to explain organ-specific and perhaps sex-specific neoplasia predisposition in Cowden syndrome, as well as why only a fraction of women with germline PTEN mutations develop breast cancer, depending on the androgen steroid milieu and levels.
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PMID:Differential regulation of PTEN expression by androgen receptor in prostate and breast cancers. 2153 17

The phosphatase and tensin homolog located on chromosome ten, PTEN, is one of the most commonly mutated tumor suppressor genes (TSGs) in human cancer [1-3]. PTEN catalyzes the conversion of the membrane lipid second messenger PIP3 to PIP2 and is therefore a key mediator of the AKT/PKB pathway [4,5]. Although inherited PTEN mutations predispose to the development of Cowden syndrome, which is also a breast cancer susceptibility syndrome, the role of PTEN in breast tumorigenesis has been considered minor when compared to that of other TSGs such as BRCA1 or p53 [6]. There is no current evidence that mutations in PTEN account for a substantial proportion of familial breast cancer in the absence of Cowden syndrome [6]. Moreover, PTEN mutations or deletions are not common in sporadic breast tumors, especially when compared with other tumor types (<5%) such as prostate cancer [7, 8].Despite this evidence, recent studies have demonstrated that PTEN protein down-regulation is frequently observed (more than 50%) in sporadic breast tumors, highlighting the relevance of the dose of this TSG for the pathogenesis of breast cancer [7-9]. Our paper, in the last month's issue of Nature Genetics provides additional evidence of the role of PTEN dose in breast cancer susceptibility, braking current dogmas regarding the development of cancer and opening to novel clinical and therapeutic implications [10].
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PMID:PTEN breast cancer susceptibility: a matter of dose. 2227 40