William Luther

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors reported the detection of previously unknown mutations in the ALK gene, which encodes a receptor tyrosine kinase, in 8% of primary neuroblastomas.

TL;DR: Combined treatment with the ATP-competitive mTOR inhibitor Torin2 overcame the resistance of ALK(F1174L)/MYCN tumors to crizotinib and suggested a strategy for improving targeted therapy for ALK-positive neuroblastoma.

TL;DR: In this article, the diaminopyrimidine TAE684 and its derivative ceritinib (LDK378), which are structurally distinct from crizotinib-resistant ALKF1174L mutation arises de novo in neuroblastoma (NB) and is acquired in ALK translocation driven cancers, lending impetus to the development of novel anaplastic lymphoma kinase (ALK) inhibitors with different modes of action.

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors used zebrafish models to study the functional consequences of aberrant PHOX2B expression in the cells of the developing sympathetic nervous system, showing that PHox2b deficiency uncouples this autoregulatory mechanism, leading to inhibition of sympathetic neuron differentiation.

TL;DR: A series of novel 3,5-diamino-1,2,4-triazole benzyl ureas was identified as having potent anaplastic lymphoma kinase (ALK) inhibition exemplified by 15a, 20a, and 23a, which exhibited antiproliferative IC50 values of 70, 40, and 20 nM in Tel-ALK transformed Ba/F3 cells, respectively.