In this paper, we characterize connections between melanoma initiation and progression scored histologically and cancer cell phenotypes such as plasticity and de-differentiation identified using a combination of highly multiplexed tissue imaging and spatial transcriptomics.10 This has provided deeper understanding of factors driving tumor cell phenotypes and should - in the longer term – improve approaches to melanoma staging and prognostication using existing markers such as SOX10, S100A1, MART1 and PRAME. This evidence concerns the gene MLANA and cancer.