AKT1 and cancer: Acting both intracellarly and extracellularly, gal-1 has been shown to promote cancer progression, chemoresistence, and induce dendritic cells anergy through upregulating COX-2/PGE2 pathway in lung cancers [21, 22]; furthermore, it can also stimulate embryonic stem cell proliferation through activation of Akt/mTOR signaling pathway [23], which plays a central role in regulating cell growth, proliferation, and survival.