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 mesenchymal 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 lymphoma kinase ( ALK) gene locus. In a subset of IMTs, the ALK C-terminal kinase 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 localized to 17q23 was detected in two cases of IMT. One of these cases exhibited a 2;17 translocation in addition to other karyotypic anomalies [46,XX,t(2;17)(p23;q23),add(16)(q24)].