In-depth analysis of T cell subpopulations revealed that high PRELP expression levels in melanoma were significantly correlated to high infiltrations of naive (HR = − 2.810; p = 1.36e−02 and HR = − 2.805; p = 1.72e−02), central memory (HR = − 4.326; p = 4.54e−05 and HR = − 3.973; p = 2.71e−04) and effector memory (HR = − 2.807; p = 1.25e−02 and HR = − 2.676; p = 2.3e−02) CD8+ T cells in both tumor skin cutaneous (Additional file 1: Fig. S5A) and metastatic melanoma (Additional file 1: Fig. S5B) datasets. This evidence concerns the gene CD8A and melanoma.