Molecular landscape of thymic epithelial tumors.

Abstract

Thymic epithelial tumors (TETs) are extremely rare and represent the most frequent tumors of the anterior mediastinum originating from epithelial cells in the thymus. Thymic epithelial tumors include thymomas (TM), thymic carcinomas (TC) and thymic neuroendocrine neoplasms (TNEN). Thymomas are the most predominant and are associated with autoimmune diseases. The available data suggests that the different histological subtypes have specific molecular alterations. Thymic carcinoma shows recurrent gene mutations, but further investigations are needed to understand the role of those mutations in the pathogenetic of the TETs. Some of the new emerging identified molecular alterations have the potential to offer new targeted therapies opening new possibilities for the treatment of thymic epithelial tumors.