Previously, we reported that BNIP3 and NIX interact with Mieap in response to various artificial cellular stresses and mediate induction of the MALM, suggesting that BNIP3 and NIX have a critical role in the Mieap-regulated mitochondrial quality control pathway.2, 3 As Mieap expression is inactivated in more than 60% of cancer cell lines owing to the promoter methylation,1 we speculated that methylation of the BNIP3 and/or NIX promoters could also be involved in the inactivation of the Mieap-regulated mitochondrial quality control pathway. Here, BNIP3L is linked to cancer.