ALK

Across TCGA pan-cancer cohorts, ALK RNA differs between tumor and matched normal tissue in 13 of 18 cancer types tested, making tumor–normal expression one of ALK’s most consistent transcriptional readouts.

The strongest signal is observed in thyroid carcinoma (THCA), where ALK RNA is more highly expressed in tumor relative to normal tissue. In most cancer types ALK is over-expressed in tumor, although a few such as COAD and BRCA show the opposite, repressed pattern.

THCA, COAD, and HNSC are the cancer types where ALK tumor–normal differential expression is most reproducible.

RNA tumor vs normal associations by lineage

Ranked by sampling consensus. Fold-change is the tumor-versus-normal difference in ALK RNA (log₂); positive values indicate higher expression in tumor. p-values are from the differential-expression test.

Lineage	Gender	Stage	Fold-change	p	Sampling consensus
THCA	Female	II,III,IV	+1.470	<.001	11	view →
COAD	Male	II,III,IV	−0.354	<.001	11	view →
HNSC	All	All	+0.135	<.001	8	view →
KIRC	Male	All	+0.190	<.001	7	view →
BRCA	All	III,IV	−0.415	<.001	6	view →
KIRP	All	All	+0.263	.003	6	view →
STAD	All	All	−0.265	.002	5	view →
READ	All	All	−0.482	.003	4	view →
UCEC	All	All	+0.299	.046	2	view →
KICH	Male	III,IV	−0.067	<.001	2	view →
BLCA	Female	III,IV	−0.079	.042	1	view →
CHOL	All	All	+0.070	.015	1	view →

Pink = over-expressed in tumor, green = repressed in tumor. Showing the 12 strongest of 13 lineages.

ALK–THCA

Open the THCA breakdown →