Purpose To explore the clinicopathologic characteristics, immunophenotype, diagnosis and differential diagnosis, molecu-lar genetic feature, treatments and prognosis of intra-abdominal EIMS. Methods Two cases of intra-abdominal EIMS were studied with clinical manifestations, histology and immunohistochemical staining, and its clinical and pathological findings were further ana-lyzed with review of the literature. Results Case 1 was a 15-year-olds male and case 2 was a 21-year-olds female both of whom pres-ented with abdominal pain. Two patients were treated by surgical excision. Microscopically the tumor consisted of two different histolog-ical types, one of which was of high cell density and the other with low cell density and myxoid stroma. Both of these areas contained inflammatory cells, mainly neutrophils with few lymphocytes and plasmocytes. Tumor cells had an epithelioid phenotype with round nu-clei and small nucleoli, various nuclear atypia and mitotic figures were also found, which consistented with the diagnosis of epithelioid inflammatory myofibroblastic sarcoma. Immunohistochemical analysis revealed that the tumor cells were positive for ALK, vimentin, desmin, and CK(AE1/AE3) (focal), and were negative for Calretinin, CD30, CD31, CD33, SMA, HHF35, Myogenin, S-100, HMB-45, CD20, CD79a, CD3, CD5, CD45 and CD68. ALK rearrangement was identified in both cases by FISH using ALK break-a-part probe. Conclusions As an extremely rare tumor, the distinguishing between epithelioid inflammatory myofibroblastic sarcoma and conventional inflammatory myofibroblastic tumor is important. ALK inhibitors are theoretically useful for treating these tumors.

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is the second most common cause of cancer-related death in the world. The pro-viral integration site for Moloney murine leukemia virus 1 (PIM1) is a proto-oncogene and belongs to the serine/threonine kinase family, which are involved in cell proliferation, migration, and apoptosis. Fibroblast growth factor receptor 1 (FGFR1) is a tyrosine kinase that has been implicated in cell proliferation, differentiation and migration. Small molecule HCI-48 is a derivative of chalcone, a class of compounds known to possess anti-tumor, anti-inflammatory and antibacterial effects. However, the underlying mechanism of chalcones against colorectal cancer remains unclear. This study reports that HCI-48 mainly targets PIM1 and FGFR1 kinases, thereby eliciting antitumor effects on colorectal cancer growth in vitro and in vivo. HCI-48 inhibited the activity of both PIM1 and FGFR1 kinases in an ATP-dependent manner, as revealed by computational docking models. Cell-based assays showed that HCI-48 inhibited cell proliferation in CRC cells (HCT-15, DLD1, HCT-116 and SW620), and induced cell cycle arrest in the G2/M phase through modulation of cyclin A2. HCI-48 also induced cellular apoptosis, as evidenced by an increase in the expression of apoptosis biomarkers such as cleaved PARP, cleaved caspase 3 and cleaved caspase 7. Moreover, HCI-48 attenuated the activation of downstream components of the PIM1 and FGFR1 signaling pathways. Using patient-derived xenograft (PDX) murine tumor models, we found that treatment with HCI-48 diminished the PDX tumor growth of implanted CRC tissue expressing high protein levels of PIM1 and FGFR1. This study suggests that the inhibitory effect of HCI-48 on colorectal tumor growth is mainly mediated through the dual-targeting of PIM1 and FGFR1 kinases. This work provides a theoretical basis for the future application of HCI-48 in the treatment of clinical CRC.