RNA-sequencing for the characterization of the transcriptome of MCF-7-derived mammospheres and parental breast cancer cells.

RNA-sequencing was performed in MCF-7-derived mammospheres and parental breast cancer cells in an effort to identify novel regulators of stemness that could potentially be targeted in luminal ER+ tumors. The bioinformatic analysis identified numerous differentially expressed genes including several known stemness markers, as well as novel genes that may play an important role in breast cancer stem cells. Overall design: Examination of the transcriptome of MCF-7 derived mammospheres and parental breast cancer cells grown in 2D monolayers and comparison of their gene expression profiles. The experiment was performed in biological duplicates.