Identifying Safeguards Disabled by Epstein-Barr Virus Infections in Genomes From Patients With Breast Cancer: Chromosomal Bioinformatics Analysis.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The causes of breast cancer are poorly understood. A potential risk factor is Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), a lifelong infection nearly everyone acquires. EBV-transformed human mammary cells accelerate breast cancer when transplanted into immunosuppressed mice, but the virus can disappear as malignant cells reproduce. If this model applies to human breast cancers, then they should have genome damage characteristic of EBV infection.

Objective

This study tests the hypothesis that EBV infection predisposes one to breast cancer by causing permanent genome damage that compromises cancer safeguards.

Methods

Publicly available genome data from approximately 2100 breast cancers and 25 ovarian cancers were compared to cancers with proven associations to EBV, including 7

SUBMITTER: Friedenson B 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11796484 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature