Many leukaemia‐associated genes were positively associated with DDIT4 expression, including WNT9A, NOTCH3, SOCS1, MCL1, HIF1A, ALOX5, CD47, CXCR4, CDK9, HRAS, PLK3 and ETS2. However, RPL5, a tumour suppressor in multiple cancers, was negatively correlated with DDIT4 expression. This evidence concerns the gene CDK9 and leukemia.