Molecular pathology of lung cancer: clinical aspects

Discovery of tyrosine kinase inhibitor sensitizing mutations in lung cancer (LC) appears to be the main event in clinical oncology of the last decade. Activating lesions in epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) gene almost guarantee tumor response to gefitinib, erlotinib or afatinib.ALK translocations are strongly associated with efficacy of crizotinib or otherALK inhibitors. Instances of success of targeted therapy have been demonstrated for LC harboring mutations in ROS1, RET, HER2, BRAF and KRAS oncogenes. Whole genome sequencing of LC-derived DNAhas revealed a number of novel potentially druggable molecules. Rapid progress in understanding of lung cancer molecular pathogenesis allows to expect that several new targeted agents for LC treatment will become available already within this decade.