By deleting Atg5 in vitro, we detected a transient decrease in the colony-forming potential of BM cells immediately following introduction of the MLL-AF9 oncogene (Figure 1g) and observed a statistically significant survival advantage in vivo for mice harboring leukemia cells with deleted Atg5 relative to controls during primary transplantation (Figures 2 and 3). This evidence concerns the gene KMT2A and leukemia.