Recently discovered protein may hold key.

• Position: Breast Cancer

A protein only recently linked to cancer has a significant effect on the risk that breast cancer will spread, and lowering the protein's level in cell cultures reduces chances for the disease to extend beyond the initial tumor, according to research published in the journal PLOS ONE.

The research suggests that reducing production of the protein called myoferlin affects cancer cells in two primary ways: by changing the activation of many genes involved in metastasis in favor of normal cell behavior, and altering mechanical properties of cancer cells--including their shape and ability to invade --so they are more likely to remain nested together rather than breaking away to travel to other tissues.

Obstetrician Douglas Kniss, senior author of the study, used subtypes of triple-negative breast cancer cells for the study--one of the most lethal forms of breast cancer because of its likelihood to spread. When the protein is present, these cells that start out round and stuck together in a pattern resembling cobblestones become irregularly shaped and tend to detach from the tumor site in an uncoordinated way--hallmarks of metastasis. They also lose their "stickiness," or adhesion property, making it easier for them to break away from neighboring cells.

In contrast, cancer cells lacking the protein tend to retain their usual shape and stickiness, and stay together in a group if they make any...