To investigate whether nilotinib can inhibit MDM2, we tested a group of ALL cell lines (three were BCR-ABL+ and three were BCR-ABL-) that were known to express different levels of MDM2 (Fig. 1) and have various p53 status (EU-1, UOC-B1 and SUP-B13: wild-type (wt)-p53; EU-6: mutant p53; EU-5 and EU-9: p53-null) [28]. This evidence concerns the gene ABL1 and acute lymphoblastic leukemia.