The importance of deciphering the tumour immune microenvironment (TIME) has been driven by the extraordinary impact on the treatment of melanoma, lung adenocarcinoma and head and neck cancers [4] of agents (typically recombinant antibodies) that inhibit with immune checkpoint molecules such as programmed cell death 1 (PD1), its ligand PD1 ligand 1 (PD-L1) or cytotoxic T lymphocyte antigen 4 (CTLA-4), all of which downregulate T-cell activation [5, 6]. This evidence concerns the gene PDCD1 and melanoma.