Advances on Driver Oncogenes of Non-small Cell Lung Cancer

Adenocarcinoma and squamous cell carcinoma are the most common histological types of non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Several molecular alterations have been defined as "driver oncogenes" responsible for both the initiation and maintenance of the malignancy. With next-generation sequencing (NGS) which having multiple and high-throughput genotyping is wildly used and promoted, make the detection of patients gene composition from a tiny tumor biopsy specimens become possible, initiate the clinical studies based on the genetic characteristics, and promote the progress of molecular typing in NSCLC. So far, about 60% of lung adenocarcinoma has been found harbouring driver oncogenes, the rate of lung squamous cell carcinoma driven genes detection has gradually improved, in which epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR), anaplastic lymphoma kinase (ALK), fibroblast growth factor receptor 1 (FGFR1), phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase catalytic subunit alpha (PIK3CA) and so on plays important roles. The currently effective targeted therapies is mainly used against EGFR, ALK, etc. In this review, we will report the mainly advances on some latest driver mutations of NSCLC.