Targeting KRAS in pancreatic adenocarcinoma: Progress in demystifying the holy grail

doi:10.5306/wjco.v14.i8.285

Advanced Search

BPG is committed to discovery and dissemination of knowledge

Home / Archive / Volume 14, Issue 8

This Article

Peer-Review Report of This Article

CrossCheck and Google Search of This Article

Academic Rules and Norms of This Article

Citation of this article

Corresponding Author of This Article

Research Domain of This Article

Article-Type of This Article

Open-Access Policy of This Article

Times Cited Counts in Google of This Article

Number of Hits and Downloads for This Article

Total Article Views (9512)

All Articles published online

The chart showing PDF series, WORD series, HTML series, Figures (1-3) series, Tables (1-2) series.

Item

Count

PDF

226

WORD

HTML

4895

Figures (1-3)

773

Tables (1-2)

846

Sum=6782

Featured Article

The chart showing Browse series, Download series.

Item

Count

Browse

330

Download

954

Sum=1284

Publishing Process of This Article

Item

Count

Browse

229

Download

869

Sum=1098

Aug 24, 2023 (publication date) through Feb 23, 2026

Times Cited of This Article

Times Cited (6)

Journal Information of This Article

Publication Name

World Journal of Clinical Oncology

ISSN

2218-4333

Publisher of This Article

Baishideng Publishing Group Inc, 7041 Koll Center Parkway, Suite 160, Pleasanton, CA 94566, USA

Minireviews

World J Clin Oncol. Aug 24, 2023; 14(8): 285-296
Published online Aug 24, 2023. doi: 10.5306/wjco.v14.i8.285

Targeting KRAS in pancreatic adenocarcinoma: Progress in demystifying the holy grail

Ahmed Elhariri, Ahmed Alhaj, Daniel Ahn, Mohamad Bassam Sonbol, Tanios Bekaii-Saab, Christina Wu, Michael Scott Rutenberg, John Stauffer, Jason Starr, Umair Majeed, Jeremy Jones, Mitesh Borad, Hani Babiker

Ahmed Elhariri, Ahmed Alhaj, Jason Starr, Umair Majeed, Jeremy Jones, Hani Babiker, Division of Hematology-Oncology, Department of Medicine, Mayo Clinic Florida, Mayo Clinic Cancer Center, Jacksonville, FL 32224, United States

Daniel Ahn, Mohamad Bassam Sonbol, Tanios Bekaii-Saab, Christina Wu, Mitesh Borad, Division of Hematology-Oncology, Department of Medicine, Mayo Clinic Arizona, Mayo Clinic Cancer Center, Phoenix, AZ 85054, United States

Michael Scott Rutenberg, Department of Radiation-Oncology, Mayo Clinic Florida, Mayo Clinic Cancer Center, Jacksonville, FL 32224, United States

John Stauffer, Department of Surgical Oncology, Hepatopancreatobiliary Surgery, Mayo Clinic Florida, Jacksonville, FL 32224, United States

Author contributions: Elhariri A and Babiker H designed and wrote the manuscript; Alhaj A, Ahn D, Sonbol MB, Bekaii-Saab T, Wu C, Rutenberg MS, Stauffer J, Starr J, Majeed U, Jones J and Borad M critically reviewed and edited the manuscript; All authors approved the final version of the manuscript.

Conflict-of-interest statement: Authors declare no conflict of interests for this article.

Corresponding author: Ahmed Elhariri, MD, Research Fellow, Division of Hematology-Oncology, Department of Medicine, Mayo Clinic Florida, Mayo Clinic Cancer Center, 4500 San Pablo Rd, Jacksonville, FL 32224, United States. Ahmed.Elhariri@bcm.edu

Received: April 12, 2023
Peer-review started: April 12, 2023
First decision: June 21, 2023
Revised: July 5, 2023
Accepted: July 27, 2023
Article in press: July 27, 2023
Published online: August 24, 2023
Processing time: 131 Days and 5.6 Hours

Abstract

Pancreatic cancer (PC) remains one of the most challenging diseases, with a very poor 5-year overall survival of around 11.5%. Kirsten rat sarcoma virus (KRAS) mutation is seen in 90%-95% of PC patients and plays an important role in cancer cell proliferation, differentiation, metabolism, and survival, making it an essential mutation for targeted therapy. Despite extensive efforts in studying this oncogene, there has been little success in finding a drug to target this pathway, labelling it for decades as “undruggable”. In this article we summarize some of the efforts made to target the KRAS pathway in PC, discuss the challenges, and shed light on promising clinical trials.

Keywords: Kirsten rat sarcoma virus; Targeted therapy; Pancreatic cancer; Drug resistance; Next generation sequencing; Clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats

Core Tip: Kirsten rat sarcoma virus (KRAS) mutation is the hallmark of pancreatic cancer (PC) and an important therapeutic target. Approaches to target this oncogene has been challenging. We herein discuss the role of KRAS in development of PC, efforts made to target this pathway, and ongoing clinical trials.