Recent advances in breast cancer biology

As medicine enters the 21st century, the field of breast cancer continues to reflect both our greatest successes and our greatest challenges as scientists, epidemiologists, and clinicians. Discoveries in the areas of breast cancer biology and genetics continue to help us refine our approach to the newly-diagnosed patient as well as guide our development of cancer prevention and early detection strategies. This review highlights some of the recent advances in breast cancer biology, with an emphasis on dysregulation of the cell cycle, inherited cancer susceptibility, and tumor-related alterations of growth regulation and signal transduction pathways.