Targeting Cas Family Proteins as a Novel Treatment for Breast Cancer

Abstract

Frequently, breast cancer is treated before and after surgery with chemotherapy, hormone, and radiation therapies. However, breast cancers can evolve and stop responding to chemotherapeutic drugs, including adriamycin (doxorubicin), and hormone therapy with tamoxifen. A new generation of targeted biological agents demonstrates a high effectiveness at lower toxicity. Treatment with these specific drugs is limited to subsets of breast cancers that depend on their targets, and eventually patients develop resistance to these drugs as well. This strongly indicates the need to develop novel approaches to fight breast tumor cells and to prevent or reduce drug-resistance. The Cas family of proteins play significant roles in development, proliferation, cell cycle control, cell survival, migration, and invasion. Some of its members, in particular p130Cas/BCAR1, has been implicated with tamoxifen as well as adriamycin resistance in mammary tumors. Here we review the role of the Cas family of proteins in breast cancer and summarize the potential development of anti-cancer therapeutics targeting this important family of adapter-type proteins.