Alternatively activated macrophages and collagen remodeling characterize the postpartum involuting mammary gland across species.

ABSTRACT: Recent pregnancy correlates with decreased survival for breast cancer patients compared with non-pregnancy-associated breast cancer. We hypothesize that postpartum mammary involution induces metastasis through wound-healing programs known to promote cancer. It is unknown whether alternatively activated M2 macrophages, immune cells important in wound-healing and experimental tumorigenesis that also predict poor prognosis for breast cancer patients, are recruited to the normal involuting gland. Macrophage markers CD68, CSF-1R, and F4/80 were examined across the pregnancy and involution cycle in rodent and human mammary tissues. Quantitative immunohistochemistry revealed up to an eightfold increase in macrophage number during involution, which returned to nulliparous levels with full regressi

SUBMITTER: O'Brien J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2832146 | biostudies-literature | 2010 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature