MYC and neuroblastoma: In particular, as p53 has previously been shown to be a direct target gene of MYCN, and a mechanism for MYCN mediated apoptosis in neuroblastoma, it is plausible that MYCN directly upregulates SKP2 to attenuate p53-mediated apoptosis (Kitagawa et al., 2008; Chen et al., 2010), as has previously been reported for c-MYC (Bretones et al., 2011; Figure 3).