High level of miR-21, miR-10b, and miR-31 expression in bilateral vs. unilateral breast carcinomas

We analyzed the expression of several microRNAs (miRs) implicated in breast cancer (BC) pathogenesis (miR-21, miR-10b, miR17-5p, mir-31, miR-155, miR-200c, miR-18a, miR-205, and miR-27a) in 80 breast carcinomas obtained from patients with bilateral BC (biBC) and 40 cases of unilateral BC (uBC). Unexpectedly, three miRs (miR-21, miR-10b and miR-31) demonstrated significantly higher level of expression in biBC vs. uBC (P = 0.0001, 0.00004 and 0.0002, respectively). Increased contents of miR-21, miR-10b and miR-31 were observed in all categories of biBC tumors, i.e., in synchronous biBC as well as in first and second tumors from metachronous biBC cases. Synchronous biBC showed more similarity of miR expression profiles within pairs that the metachronous doublets (P = 0.004). This study suggests that bilateral breast tumors have somewhat distinct pattern of molecular events as compared to the unilateral disease.