Although mutations in the parkin gene are frequently associated with familial Parkinsonism,
emerging evidence suggests that parkin also plays a role in cancers as a putative tumor
suppressor. Supporting this, we show here that parkin expression is dramatically reduced in
several breast cancer-derived cell lines as well as in primary breast cancer tissues.
Importantly, we found that ectopic parkin expression in parkin-deficient breast cancer cells
mitigates their proliferation rate both in vitro and in vivo, as well as reduces the capacity of …