AML patients frequently show increased AKT1 activity, providing leukemic cells with growth and survival promoting signals (Tang et al., 2015) and enhanced AKT activation has been implicated in the transformation from MDS to AML and overexpression of AKT has been shown to induce leukemia in mice (Kharas et al., 2010). The gene discussed is AKT1; the disease is myelodysplastic syndrome.