Importantly, the expression of the human orthologues of poorly cross-reacting cytokines SCF, granulocyte/macrophage-stimulating factor (GM-CSF) and IL-3 (SGM3) significantly improved the repopulation capacity of patient-derived AML xenografts59, suggesting that these signals are important for LSCs in AML. The gene discussed is KITLG; the disease is acute myeloid leukemia.