Somatic mutations in the BRCA2 gene and high frequency of allelic loss of BRCA2 in sporadic male breast cancer

Breast cancer occurs rarely in men and risk factors for the disease include germline mutations of the BRCA2 gene. High frequency of allelic loss at the BRCA2 locus has been reported in sporadic breast tumors, but somatic mutations of BRCA2 are very rare. Here we report the first case of somatic BRCA2 mutation in male breast cancer with demonstrated loss of heterozygosity. We analyzed a series of 27 archival samples from male breast cancer patients for BRCA2 mutations and loss of heterozygosity at BRCA2 locus. The mutation analysis of BRCA2 gene was performed using SSCA-HA and sequencing methods. PCR was used to detect LOH at 3 highly polymorphic microsatellite markers spanning BRCA2 region on 13q by comparing the allelic pattern in matched tumor and blood DNA samples. In this study LOH at the BRCA2 locus was observed in 82.6% of informative cases, confirming previous observations on high frequency of LOH affecting the BRCA2 region in male breast cancer. We identified 5 somatic BRCA2 mutations in a set of 23 sporadic male breast cancers (21%). Two silent and 1 missense alterations were novel BRCA2 variants. Here we also report first somatic frameshift BRCA2 mutation in male breast cancer 8138de15. In 3 tumors with somatic BRCA2 alterations, 1 missense, 1 silent and frameshift LOH at chromosome 13q12-13 were detected and losses involved a wild-type allele of BRCA2 gene. (C) 2002 Wiley-Liss, Inc.