Background: The 70 kDa ribosomal protein S6 kinase (RPS6KB1), located at 17q23, is amplified and overexpressed in 10–30% of primary breast cancers and breast cancer cell lines. p70S6K is a serine/threonine kinase regulated by PI3K/mTOR pathway, which plays a crucial role in control of cell cycle, growth and survival. Our aim was to determine p70S6K and PI3K/mTOR/p70S6K pathway dependent gene expression profiles by microarrays using five breast cancer cell lines with predefined gene copy number and gene expression alterations. The p70S6K dependent profiles were determined by siRNA silencing of RPS6KB1 in two breast cancer cell lines overexpressing p70S6K. These profiles were further correlated with gene expression alterations caused by inhibition of PI3K/mTOR pathway with PI3K inhibitor Ly294002 or mTOR inhibitor rapamycin. Results: Altogether, the silencing of p70S6K altered the expression of 109 and 173 genes in two breast cancer cell lines and 67 genes were altered in both cell lines in addition to RPS6KB1. Furthermore, 17 genes including VTCN1 and CDKN2B showed overlap with genes differentially expressed after PI3K or mTOR inhibition. The gene expression signatures responsive to both PI3K/mTOR pathway and p70S6K inhibitions revealed previously unidentified genes suggesting novel downstream targets for PI3K/mTOR/p70S6K pathway. Conclusion: Since p70S6K overexpression is associated with aggressive disease and poor prognosis of breast cancer patients, the potential downstream targets of p70S6K and the whole PI3K/mTOR/p70S6K pathway identified in our study may have diagnostic value.

We performed an integrated array comparative genomic hybridization (aCGH) and expression microarray analysis of 8 normal gastric tissues and 38 primary tumors, including 25 intestinal and 13 diffuse gastric adenocarcinomas to identify genes whose expression is deregulated in association with copy number alteration. Our aim was also to identify molecular genetic alterations that are specific to particular clinicopathological characteristics of gastric cancer. Distinct molecular genetic profiles were identified for intestinal and diffuse gastric cancers and for tumors obtained from 2 different locations of the stomach. Interestingly, the ERBB2 amplification and gains at 20q13.12‐q13.33 almost exclusively discriminated intestinal cancers from the diffuse type. In addition, the 17q12‐q25 gain was characteristic to cancers located in corpus and the 20q13.12‐q13.13 gain was more common in the antrum. Statistical analysis was performed using integrated copy number and expression data to identify genes showing differential expression associated with a copy number alteration. Genes with the highest statistical significance included ERBB2, MUC1, GRB7, PPP1R1B and PPARBP with concomitant changes in copy number and expression. Immunohistochemical analysis of ERBB2 and MUC1 on a tissue microarray containing 78 independent gastric tissues showed statistically significant differences (p < 0.05 and <0.001) in immunopositivity in the intestinal (31 and 70%) and diffuse subtypes (14 and 41%), respectively. In conclusion, our results demonstrate that intestinal and diffuse type gastric cancers as well as cancers located in different sites of the stomach have distinct molecular profiles which may have clinical value.