A study of the proliferative activity of DNA polymerase alpha immunoreactivity in breast cancer

: DNA polymerase alpha activity is associated with cell proliferation, independently of the cell cycle phase, and a simple and reproducible method for the immunohistochemical demonstration of DNA polymerase alpha has been developed. In an analysis of a total of 76 human breast cancer tissues using this procedure, the clinico-pathological findings revealed that only the estrogen receptor (ER) significantly correlated with the DNA polymerase alpha activity. Therefore, this suggests that ER-negative tumors had a higher proliferative activity.