BAX and neoplasm: Recent reports by our group and others have suggested the proapoptotic BAX protein to act as a tumour suppressor in human malignancies (Zhan et al, 1994; Zhang et al, 2000; Schelwies et al, 2002; Klump et al, 2004) playing a key role in mediating the apoptotic programme in response to genotoxic stress (Theodorakis et al, 2002).