Researchers at Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa, Fla., and colleagues in California have found that the XL888 inhibitor can prevent resistance to the chemotherapy drug vemurafenib, commonly used for treating patients with melanoma. Vemurafenib resistance is characterized by a diminished apoptosis (programmed cancer cell death) response. According to the researchers, the balance between apoptosis and cell survival is regulated by a family of proteins. The survival of melanoma cells is controlled, in part, by an anti-apoptotic protein (Mcl-1) that is regulated by a particular kind of inhibitor
