In the present study, the putative contribution of p53 germline mutations to inherited predisposition to breast/ovarian cancer was assessed, initially by genotyping high-risk Jewish individual noncarriers of the predominant Jewish BRCA1/2 mutations for p53 germline mutations, and subsequently by comparing the distribution of the R72P alleles among cases and controls. The gene discussed is BRCA1; the disease is ovarian carcinoma.