Dr. Paolo Toniolo and Co-Investigators Awarded $1.4 Million Grant
October 05, 2008
Dr. Paolo Toniolo of the Division of Epidemiology with Dr. Alan Arslan and co-investigators from the Institute of Environmental Medicine, the Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia and the University of Umeå, Sweden, was recently awarded $1.4 million from the Avon Foundation for Breast Cancer Research.
Their collaborative study, titled "Characterization and Validation of Genomic Expression Signature of Pregnancy" is rooted on preliminary evidence that giving birth may confer a genetic signature detectable in the breast and different from that of women who never experienced pregnancy. If confirmed, these observations will lead to a better understanding of the unknown biological determinants of the well-established lifetime protection from breast cancer that a pregnancy confers to the mother.
The project’s goal is to characterize and validate the proposed genomic signature in a manner independent of previous observations in preparation for a much larger program seeking to develop biomarkers reflecting the genomic and physiological changes in the breast associated with pregnancy for applications in chemo-preventive interventions aiming at reducing the impact of breast cancer.
