Fusion of the ALK gene to the clathrin heavy chain gene, CLTC, in inflammatory myofibroblastic tumor

Inflammatory myofibroblastic tumor (IMT) is a rare, but distinctive mesench ymal neoplasm composed of fascicles of bland myofibroblasts admixed with a prominent inflammatory component. Genetic studies of IMTs have demonstrated chromosomal abnormalities of 2p23 and rearrangement of the anaplastic lymp homa kinase (ALK) gene locus. in a subset of IMTs, the ALK C-terminal kinas e domain is fused with a tropomyosin N-terminal coiled-coil domain. In the current study, fusion of ALK with the clathrin heavy chain (CTLC) gene loca lized to 17q23 was detected in two cases of IMT. One of these cases exhibit ed a 2;17 translocation in addition to other karyotypic anomalies [46,XX,t( 2;17)(p23;q23),add(16)(q24)].