Regulation of cancer cell survival, migration, and invasion by twist: AKT2 comes to interplay

Metastasis, the foremost cause of mortality in cancer patients, is increasingly recognized as a coordinated biological process. The multistep process of metastasis posts difficulty in studying its mechanism and molecular basis. Recent works have shown that the basic helix-loop-helix transcriptional factor Twist and the serine/threonine kinase AKT play pivotal roles in tumor development and progression. Our recent study has shown that AKT2 is a transcriptional regulatory target of Twist and acts downstream of Twist to promote cancer cell survival, migration, and invasion. Functional convergence of Twist and AKT2 underscores the importance of this signaling pathway in tumor development and progression and as a potential therapeutic target.