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Kirsten Rat Sarcoma Viral Oncogene Homolog Mutations: Comparison
Please note this is a comparison between Version 2 by Camila Xu and Version 1 by Samantha Epistolio.

The Rat Sarcoma virus (RAS) gene family is characterized by three genes (KRASNRAS and HRAS) encoding for closely related GTPase proteins responsible for the signal transduction within the mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) and phosphatidylinositol 3 kinase (PI3K) pathways. KRAS mutations are the most important and frequent alterations in this family, accounting for 85% of RAS mutations observed in the oncologic population.

  • KRAS
  • lung adenocarcinoma
  • KRAS biology
  • prognosis

1. Introduction

The Rat Sarcoma virus (RAS) gene family is characterized by three genes (KRASNRAS and HRAS) encoding for closely related GTPase proteins responsible for the signal transduction within the mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) and phosphatidylinositol 3 kinase (PI3K) pathways. This group of genes is associated with the control of cell growth, survival and differentiation [1[1][2],2], and it is characterized by the most frequently observed genomic alterations in human cancers, being detected in approximately 19% of tumors [3,4][3][4].
KRAS mutations are the most important and frequent alterations in this family, accounting for 85% of RAS mutations observed in the oncologic population [5]. More specifically, KRAS exon 2, exon 3 and exon 4 mutations are present in 13.98%, 1.17% and 0.62% of all cancer types [2[2][6],6], respectively, especially in pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) (88% of patients), in colorectal cancer (CRC) (45–50% of cases) and in lung adenocarcinoma (AC) (30–35% of patients) (Table 1) [5,6,7,8][5][6][7][8].
Table 1.
 Cancers with the highest 
KRAS
 mutations frequencies.
Cancer KRAS Mutations Percentage
PDAC 88%
CRC 45–50%
Lung AC 30–35%
AC: AdenoCarcinoma; CRC: ColoRectal Cancer; PDAC: Pancreatic Ductal AdenoCarcinoma (AACR Project GENIE Consortium, 2017 [7]; Prior et al., 2020 [6]; Uras et al., 2020 [8]; Reck et al., 2021 [5]).

2. KRAS Mutations in Lung Cancer

The protein encoded by KRAS is a GTPase regulated by tyrosine kinase receptors that in turn activate the RAF/MEK/MAPK and PI3K/AKT signaling pathways, leading to a strong promotion of cell growth and replication that determines cell survival. The presence of mutations in KRAS blocks this protein in the active GTP-bound conformation, thereby activating constitutively downstream signaling pathways, finally resulting in uncontrolled cell growth [11][9]. Specifically, this continuous activation confers to cancer cells the ability to grow in lower glucose concentrations than those required for the growth of normal cells or cancer cells that do not have KRAS mutations [12,13][10][11]. As for other cancer types, KRAS mutations in lung cancers typically occur in hot-spot codons of exons 2, 3 and 4.

2.1. KRAS Mutations in NSCLC

In general, lung cancer has a complex and heterogeneous background. Indeed, it can be histologically subdivided into non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and small cell lung cancer (SCLC), accounting for 85% and 15% of all lung neoplasia, respectively [14][12]. NSCLCs are further subdivided into three histologic types: AC, squamous-cell carcinoma (SCC) and large-cell carcinoma (LCC), which represent 40%, 25–30% and 5–10% of all lung cancers, respectively [8]. The occurrence of KRAS mutations differs based on the specific lung cancer type/subtype, being higher in NSCLC than in SCLC, and within NSCLC, KRAS mutations are more frequent in lung AC than SCC (Table 2). Interestingly, a recent study established two different groups of KRAS-mutant NSCLC, KRAS-dependent and KRAS-independent according to their requirement for KRAS mutations to maintain oncogenicity. However, to date, these data are preliminary and need to be confirmed in larger cohorts [11][9].
Table 2.
 Rates of 
KRAS
 mutations in NSCLC and subtypes.

2.1.1. KRAS Mutations in Lung Adenocarcinoma

In the AC subtype, almost 30–35% of cases are driven by a KRAS mutation [5[5][6][7][8],6,7,8], mainly in exon 2, with the c.34G > T (p.G12C) change being the most prevalent (Table 3) [15][13].
Table 3.
 Rates of 
KRAS
 exons 2, 3 and 4 mutations in NSCLC.
KRAS Mutations Frequencies
Exon 2 codon 12  
c.34G > T (p.G12C) 40%
c.35G > T (p.G12V) 19–21%
c.35G > A (p.G12D) 15–17%
c.35G > C (p.G12A) 6%
c.34G > A (p.G12S) 4%
c.34G > C (p.G12R) 4%
Exon 2 codon 13  
c.37G > T (p.G13C) 6.8%
c.38G > A (p.G13D) 0.8%
c.37G > C (p.G13R) 0.6%
c.37G > A (p.G13S) NR
Exon 3 codon 59  
c.176C > A (p.A59E) NR
c.176C > G (p.A59G) NR
c.175G > A (p.A59T) NR
Exon 3 codon 61 NR
c.183A > C (p.Q61H) 1.2%
c.182A > T (p.Q61L) 0.4%
c.182A > G (p.Q61R) 0.06%
c.180_181delinsAA (p.Q61K) 0.02%
c.181C > G (p.Q61E) NR
Exon 4 codon 146  
c.436G > C (p.A146P) NR
c.436G > A (p.A146T) NR
c.437C > T (p.A146V) NR
NR: Not Relevant; NSCLC: Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer (AACR Project GENIE Consortium, 2017 [7]).

3. KRAS Mutations in Population-Based Cohorts of Lung Adenocarcinomas

The frequency of KRAS mutation in patients affected by lung AC differs among ethnicities and countries of origin, being higher in Caucasian (where they are detected in up to 30% of patients) than in Asians or in Africans (occurring in 16% and 9% of cases, respectively) [19,20,21,22,23,24,25][14][15][16][17][18][19][20].

3.1. KRAS Mutations in Caucasians Affected by Lung AC

In Europe, the most frequent KRAS mutations in lung AC are found in exon 2, with a general mutational rate close to 30% [19,20,21][14][15][16]. Differences can also be observed among European countries (28% in Germany, 29–31% in France, 27% in Italy, 19–27% in Greece and 43.3% in Spain) [19,20,21,26,27,28,29][14][15][16][21][22][23][24] and even among regions of the same country: for example, the island of Sardinia in Italy has the lowest frequency among all Italian regions [30][25]. This difference could be due to the physical separation of the island from the country, reflecting different lifestyle or environmental behaviors. In Europe, 86% of mutations in exon 2 are located in codon 12, with the c.34G > T (p.G12C) mutation being the most common one (observed in 34% of cases) [19][14] (Table 4).
Table 4.
 Rates of 
KRAS
 mutations in lung AC subdivided in different ethnicities.

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