Vascular density of histologically benign breast tissue from women with breast cancer: associations with tissue composition and tumor characteristics.

ABSTRACT: In breast tumors, it is well established that intratumoral angiogenesis is crucial for malignant progression, but little is known about the vascular characteristics of extratumoral, cancer-adjacent breast. Genome-wide transcriptional data suggest that extratumoral microenvironments may influence breast cancer phenotypes; thus, histologic features of cancer-adjacent tissue may also have clinical implications. To this end, we developed a digital algorithm to quantitate vascular density in approximately 300 histologically benign tissue specimens from breast cancer patients enrolled in the UNC Normal Breast Study (NBS). Specimens were stained for CD31, and vascular content was compared to demographic variables, tissue composition metrics, and tumor molecular features. We observed that the vasc

SUBMITTER: Fuller AM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7029625 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature