High-Level Expression of Wild-Type p53 in Melanoma Cells is Frequently Associated with Inactivity in p53 Reporter Gene Assays

Background Inactivation of the p53 pathway that controls cell cycle progression, apoptosis and senescence, has been proposed to occur in virtually all human tumors and p53 is the protein most frequently mutated in human cancer. However, the mutational status of p53 in melanoma is still controversial; to clarify this notion we analysed the largest series of melanoma samples reported to date.