{"entity":{"id":"paper-slamon-her2-amplification-science-1987","kind":"paper","name":"Slamon 1987: HER2 gene amplification marks an aggressive form of breast cancer","aka":[],"tldr":"Extra copies of the HER2 gene were found in about a quarter to a third of breast cancers and picked out the patients most likely to relapse, the discovery that made HER2 a drug target and a test.","summary":"Slamon and colleagues measured copies of the HER2/neu gene in 189 primary human breast cancers and found amplification in 53 of them, about 28%, with amplification ranging from 2- to more than 20-fold. In node-positive patients, amplification was a strong and independent predictor of both time to relapse and survival, stronger than most conventional factors. The paper established HER2 as a marker of aggressive disease and, with later work showing the receptor's role in growth signalling, as the target that trastuzumab would hit a decade later.","asOf":"2026-09-08","links":[{"label":"Full text (DOI)","url":"https://doi.org/10.1126/science.3798106"}],"tags":[],"related":["paper-slamon-trastuzumab-nejm-2001","paper-asco-cap-er-pr-testing-guideline-jco-2010"],"cancers":["breast-her2-positive","tnbc"],"sections":[],"technologies":[],"targets":["her2"],"drugs":[],"companies":[],"institutions":[],"pathways":[],"terms":[],"trials":[],"people":["dennis-slamon"],"bottlenecks":[],"keyPapers":[],"journals":[],"dependsOn":[],"notes":[],"journal":"Science","year":1987,"doi":"10.1126/science.3798106","pmid":"3798106","authors":"Slamon DJ, Clark GM, Wong SG, et al.","paperType":"translational","findings":["HER2/neu amplification in 53 of 189 primary breast cancers (about 28%).","Amplification correlated with the number of positive lymph nodes and, in node-positive patients, with shorter time to relapse and shorter survival.","Amplification was an independent prognostic factor in multivariate analysis, stronger than tumour size or hormone receptor status."],"whatItMeans":"Every HER2 test, every trastuzumab prescription and the whole HER2-positive breast cancer category trace back to this observation. It is the model for how a genomic marker of bad prognosis became a drug target and then the basis for one of the largest survival gains in solid tumour oncology.","caveats":["Prognostic effect was clearest in node-positive disease; the node-negative signal was weaker in this dataset.","Measured gene copies by Southern blot; clinical testing later moved to immunohistochemistry and in situ hybridisation with their own cut-offs."],"changedPractice":true},"route":"/key-papers/paper-slamon-her2-amplification-science-1987/","neighbours":{"paper":[{"id":"paper-asco-cap-er-pr-testing-guideline-jco-2010","kind":"paper","name":"American Society of Clinical Oncology/College Of American Pathologists guideline recommendations for immunohistochemical testing of estrogen and progesterone receptors in breast cancer","route":"/key-papers/paper-asco-cap-er-pr-testing-guideline-jco-2010/"},{"id":"paper-slamon-her2-breast-ovarian-science-1989","kind":"paper","name":"Slamon 1989: HER2/neu in human breast and ovarian cancer","route":"/key-papers/paper-slamon-her2-breast-ovarian-science-1989/"},{"id":"paper-slamon-trastuzumab-nejm-2001","kind":"paper","name":"Slamon 2001: adding trastuzumab to chemotherapy for HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer","route":"/key-papers/paper-slamon-trastuzumab-nejm-2001/"},{"id":"paper-yarden-sliwkowski-erbb-network-nrmcb-2001","kind":"paper","name":"Yarden and Sliwkowski 2001: untangling the ErbB signalling network","route":"/key-papers/paper-yarden-sliwkowski-erbb-network-nrmcb-2001/"}],"cancer":[{"id":"breast-her2-positive","kind":"cancer","name":"HER2-positive breast cancer","route":"/cancers/breast-her2-positive/"},{"id":"tnbc","kind":"cancer","name":"Triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC)","route":"/cancers/tnbc/"}],"target":[{"id":"her2","kind":"target","name":"HER2","route":"/targets/her2/"}],"person":[{"id":"dennis-slamon","kind":"person","name":"Dennis J. Slamon","route":"/people/dennis-slamon/"}],"roadmap":[{"id":"tnbc-roadmap","kind":"roadmap","name":"Triple-negative breast cancer roadmap: from a remainder defined by three negative tests to immunotherapy, antibody-drug conjugates and the residual disease problem","route":"/roadmaps/tnbc-roadmap/"}]}}