Occurrence of a fetal fibroblast phenotype in familial breast cancer.

We have previously shown that fetal and adult human skin fibroblasts display distinctive migratory phenotypes when cultured on 3-dimensional collagen gels in vitro. In the present study, we have used this information to assess the migratory behavior of fibroblasts obtained from patients with either benign or malignant breast disease, and correlated this with the presence of a family history of breast cancer. We have observed that fibroblasts from 17/34 patients with no previous family history of breast cancer displayed fetal-type behavior in our assay system; in contrast, fibroblasts from 15/16 patients with a positive family history of breast cancer behaved abnormally. This apparently increased probability of expressing a fetal-type migratory phenotype in the patients with a family history is statistically significant (p less than 0.008). Skin fibroblasts obtained from 2 healthy and unaffected first-degree relatives (one male and one female) of patients with a family history of breast cancer also exhibited a fetal-type migratory phenotype.