In our breast cancer cohorts, protein measurement of these biomarkers by QIF displayed similar patterns (Fig. 4, protein expression of each marker in all fields of view, without co-localization to assimilate information retrieved from mRNA data) but with significant correlations for all three pairs (MMP-9–CD163 P <0.001, Spearman r = 0.78; MMP-9–CD68 P <0.001, Spearman r = 0.8; and CD68-CD163 P <0.001, Spearman r = 0.664). This evidence concerns the gene MMP9 and breast cancer.