Breakthrough in skin cancer warning

A faulty cell signalling system that acts like a jammed accelerator in a car could be behind most cases of lethal skin cancer.

British researchers said today a protein called BRN-2 is wrongly produced in 90 per cent of malignant melanoma cells. Tests for excess levels could help distinguish between potentially lethal melanomas and less dangerous moles, according to the Marie Curie Research Institute in Oxted, Surrey.