Role of BMP4 and RHOA signalling in breast cancer

Abstract

Breast cancer is the second leading cause of cancer-related death in women worldwide and most of these deaths are due to metastatic breast cancer. Metastatic breast cancer is not easily treatable since it is invasive, and spreads to several organs. Targeted therapy is available for some breast cancer subtypes, based on their receptor expression and tumour stage. However, triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC), which lacks estrogen, Her2, and progesterone receptors, is aggressive and does not respond to hormone therapy. Surgery and chemotherapy are still the standard treatments for TNBC, however, they are effective only in the early stages. Therefore, one of the ways to effectively combat cancer is to understand the underlying signalling pathways that drive them so that they can be targeted for therapy. Although there is a myriad of interconnected signalling pathways that get activated in the spread of cancer, we have focused mainly on the BMP, WNT, and RHOA signalling pathways.