Insulin-like growth factor-I and IGF-IR are highly expressed in pancreatic cancer cell lines, where initiation of intracellular signalling through IGF-IR leads to decreased apoptosis and increased proliferation, invasion, and expression of mediators of angiogenesis (Ohmura et al, 1990; Bergmann et al, 1995; Stoeltzing et al, 2003; Zeng et al, 2003; Neid et al, 2004). Here, IGF1R is linked to familial pancreatic carcinoma.