Acinar-ductal metaplasia in pancreatic acinar cells may lead to cancer; DCLK1+ pancreatic epithelial cells are involved in regeneration following injury or inflammation (according to the lineage-tracing experiment); KRAS mutation in DCLK1+ pancreatic epithelial cells in pancreatitis may lead to pancreatic cancer (Nakanishi et al., 2013). Here, DCLK1 is linked to pancreatic neoplasm.