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High-throughput surface marker screen on primary human breast tissues reveals further cellular heterogeneity

Published version
Peer-reviewed

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Authors

Virtanen, Siru 
Schulte, Reiner 
Stingl, John 
Caldas, Carlos 
Shehata, Mona 

Abstract

Abstract: Background: Normal human breast tissues are a heterogeneous mix of epithelial and stromal subtypes in different cell states. Delineating the spectrum of cellular heterogeneity will provide new insights into normal cellular properties within the breast tissue that might become dysregulated in the initial stages of cancer. Investigation of surface marker expression provides a valuable approach to resolve complex cell populations. However, the majority of cell surface maker expression of primary breast cells have not been investigated. Methods: To determine the differences in expression of a range of uninvestigated cell surface markers between the normal breast cell subpopulations, primary human breast cells were analysed using high-throughput flow cytometry for the expression of 242 cell surface proteins in conjunction with EpCAM/CD49f staining. Results: We identified 35 surface marker proteins expressed on normal breast epithelial and/or stromal subpopulations that were previously unreported. We also show multiple markers were equally expressed in all cell populations (e.g. CD9, CD59, CD164) while other surface markers were confirmed to be enriched in different cell lineages: CD24, CD227 and CD340 in the luminal compartment, CD10 and CD90 in the basal population, and CD34 and CD140b on stromal cells. Conclusions: Our dataset of CD marker expression in the normal breast provides better definition for breast cellular heterogeneity.

Description

Funder: Cancer Research UK; doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100000289

Keywords

Research Article, Normal breast, Surface markers, Breast epithelial cells, Stromal, Luminal progenitor, Antibody screen

Journal Title

Breast Cancer Research

Conference Name

Journal ISSN

1465-542X

Volume Title

23

Publisher

BioMed Central