The ‘angiogenic enzyme’ thymidine phosphorylase (TP) is commonly upregulated in many solid tumours including TCC (O'Brien et al, 1996), and overexpression has been shown to correlate with increased tumour invasion (O'Brien et al, 1996; Sawase et al, 1998) and poor prognosis (Arima et al, 2000) in bladder carcinoma. The gene discussed is TYMP; the disease is urinary bladder carcinoma.