{"doi":"10.1126/sciadv.abm3548","title":"Identification of a minority population of LMO2 <sup>+</sup> breast cancer cells that integrate into the vasculature and initiate metastasis","abstract":"Metastasis is responsible for most breast cancer–related deaths; however, identifying the cellular determinants of metastasis has remained challenging. Here, we identified a minority population of immature THY1 + / VEGFA + tumor epithelial cells in human breast tumor biopsies that display angiogenic features and are marked by the expression of the oncogene, LMO2 . Higher abundance of LMO2 + basal cells correlated with tumor endothelial content and predicted poor distant recurrence–free survival in patients. Using MMTV-PyMT/Lmo2 CreERT2 mice, we demonstrated that Lmo2 lineage–traced cells integrate into the vasculature and have a higher propensity to metastasize. LMO2 knockdown in human breast tumors reduced lung metastasis by impairing intravasation, leading to a reduced frequency of circulating tumor cells. Mechanistically, we find that LMO2 binds to STAT3 and is required for STAT3 activation by tumor necrosis factor–α and interleukin-6. Collectively, our study identifies a population of metastasis-initiating cells with angiogenic features and establishes the LMO2-STAT3 signaling axis as a therapeutic target in breast cancer metastasis.","journal":"Science Advances","year":2022,"id":266193,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":10,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9528,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2022-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":110544,"name":"Gunsagar S. Gulati","orcid":"0000-0003-2798-6220","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":74004,"name":"Jane Antony","orcid":"0000-0002-2424-5470","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":260761,"name":"Isobel J. Fetter","orcid":"0000-0002-6021-2713","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":74032,"name":"Angera H. Kuo","orcid":"0000-0001-6955-9951","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":769485,"name":"William Hai Dang Ho","orcid":"0000-0003-1365-9624","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":925841,"name":"Veronica Haro-Acosta","orcid":"0000-0003-4836-9686","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":738849,"name":"Soumyashree Das","orcid":"0000-0003-1236-3194","position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":110541,"name":"Chloé B. Steen","orcid":"0000-0001-7290-7128","position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":820565,"name":"Thiago A. Pereira","orcid":"0000-0002-8755-0683","position":9,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":110561,"name":"Dalong Qian","orcid":"0000-0002-6261-5188","position":10,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":74111,"name":"Philip A. Beachy","orcid":"0000-0003-1098-9046","position":11,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":110563,"name":"Frederick M. Dirbas","orcid":"0000-0003-3576-6404","position":12,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":74140,"name":"Kristy Red‐Horse","orcid":"0000-0003-1541-601X","position":13,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":618438,"name":"Terence H. Rabbitts","orcid":"0000-0002-4982-2609","position":14,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":286306,"name":"Jean Paul Thiery","orcid":"0000-0003-0478-5020","position":15,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":17223,"name":"Aaron M. Newman","orcid":"0000-0002-1857-8172","position":16,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":55808,"name":"Michael F. Clarke","orcid":"0000-0001-6889-4926","position":17,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":74131,"name":"Shaheen S. Sikandar","orcid":"0000-0003-1867-6378","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":70,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-19T00:26:54.081997Z","pmid":"36351009","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}