Bruna et al. 2007 demonstrated that high TGFβ-Smad activity is present in aggressive, highly proliferative gliomas and confers poor prognosis in patients with glioma [7], while a lack of Smad expression appears to be correlated with tumour development and poor prognosis in patients with esophageal squamous cell carcinoma [8] breast cancer [9] and colorectal cancer [10]. The gene discussed is TGFB1; the disease is glioma.