A significant increase in expression of pTyr284-Ack1 and pTyr176-AKT was seen when breast cancers from progressive stages were examined, i.e. normal to hyperplasia (ADH), ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS), invasive ductal carcinoma (IDC) and lymph node metastatic (LNMM) stages (Fig. 6A–C and Table 1). Here, TNK2 is linked to ductal breast carcinoma in situ.