Genomic approaches to understanding and treating breast cancer

Breast cancer is the most common malignancy afflicting women from Western cultures. It has been estimated that approximately 211,000 women will be diagnosed with breast cancer in 2003 in the United States alone, and distressingly each year over 40,000 women will die of this disease. Developments in breast cancer molecular and cellular biology research have brought us closer to understanding the genetic basis of this disease. Unfortunately, this information has not yet to be incorporated into the routine diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer in the clinic. Recent advancements in microarray technology hold the promise of further increasing our understanding of the complexity and heterogeneity of this disease, and providing new avenues for the prognostication and prediction of breast cancer outcomes. The most recent application of microarray genomic technologies to studying breast cancer will be the focus of this review.