BMI1 and cancer: 2011). The contribution of BMI‐1 to multiple cancers is thought to be due to its role in self‐renewal and differentiation of stem cells (Lessard and Sauvageau 2003). With these unique properties of regulating cell senescence, BMI‐1 has been the focus of attention particularly in the delay of cell senescence in many cell types, for example, stem cell feeder cells (McKay et al. 2011). Recently, transduction of HBEC with combinations of hTERT and BMI‐1 has generated some promising data (Fulcher et al. 2009).