The suppression of FST was mirrored in breast cancer cell lines compared with immortalized, nontransformed human mammary epithelial cell lines (MCF10A and MCF12A) and was independent of molecular subtype or receptor status (Fig. 1d and Additional file 3: Figure S2a), suggesting that suppression of FST expression may be an integral step in breast tumorigenesis, regardless of the oncogenic driver. Here, FST is linked to breast carcinoma.