Of Mice and Women: A Short History of Mouse Mammary Cancer Research with an Emphasis on the Paradigms Inspired by the Transplantation Method

The ability to transplant mammary epithelial cells of any age or developmental stage to the normal anatomical site of an inbred recipient mouse strain has revolutionized the studies of mammary development and tumor biology over the past 50 years. This simple method has made the mammary gland of the rodent one of the most accessible and studied organs and facilitated our understanding of the fundamental cellular and molecular properties of normal and neoplastic development. This short review outlines the early concepts that led to the development of the transplantation technology and the impact of this method on our understanding for a variety of processes important both for the normal development and differentiation of the gland as well as the phenomena of neoplastic progression.