A new study from a team of researchers at UC Irvine, including scientists from theLander lab in the Department of Developmental and Cell Biology and the Ganesan lab in the Department of Dermatology, sheds light on how melanoma, a dangerous form of skin cancer, can arise even from minimal genetic changes.
Using mouse models, the research team found that activating a single cancer-driving mutation in the gene Braf was sometimes enough to spark slow-growing tumors — even without the multiple mutations typically seen in aggressive melanomas. By applying single-cell transcriptomics, they identified a population of cells in the skin resembling “neural crest-like” cells, which appear to act as precursors that, in combination with Braf mutations, can expand and eventually give rise to malignant cells.
This discovery highlights an intermediate state that could be crucial for understanding how melanomas arise and why they can vary so widely in their behavior. The findings may also inform new diagnostic and therapeutic strategies that target melanoma at its earliest stages.
The study, entitled “Uncovering minimal pathways in melanoma initiation”, was published in the June 2025 issue of Nature Communications