Role of c-mesenchymal–epithelial transition pathway in gastric cancer

Introduction: Gastric cancer is the fourth most common cancer burden worldwide; many patients show incurable disease at the time of diagnosis and prognosis remains unfavorable. Recently, new findings on gastric cancer biology led to the preclinical and clinical development of new compounds aiming to improve the overall survival and to preserve quality of life and reducing chemotherapy-related toxicities. Patients with human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) overexpression/amplification have experienced benefit from the integration of trastuzumab to the standard chemotherapy. Ramucirumab has been recently approved in second line for treatment of gastric cancer.Areas covered: Drugs targeting molecules such as anti c-mesenchymal-epithelial transition (MET), mammalian target of rapamycin inhibitors, polo-like kinase 1 inhibitors are under investigation or in preclinical or early clinical development. Approximately 10 – 20% of gastric cancer presented an increased MET gene copy numbers; inappropriate a...