A study of Mexican patients reveals previously unknown details about acral melanoma, the most common subtype of skin cancer in Latin America.
For decades, acral melanoma, an aggressive skin cancer that appears on the palms of the hands, soles of the feet, or under the nails, has been considered rare in medical literature due to its low incidence in the United States and Europe. However, it is the most common type of melanoma in Latin America: in Mexico, this cancer, for which there is no specific treatment, accounts for half of the 3,500 annual melanoma diagnoses, most of which are in advanced stages due to the atypical location of the lesions and their silent growth. This was the scenario that led Daniela Robles-Espinoza, coordinator of the International Laboratory for Human Genome Research (LIIGH) at UNAM, to embark on a long-term investigation into the genetic mysteries behind acral melanoma in 2015. The result, a pioneering study conducted with samples from Mexican patients, reveals unprecedented details about the genes and mutations responsible for this cancer and lays the foundation for the development of effective tre...
