AKT1 and melanoma: On one hand, besides influencing reactive oxygen species (ROS), elevated copper uptake can enhance tumorigenesis (termed cuproplasia) by directly binding and activating downstream oncogenic proteins such as MAPK, AKT and ULK1, to promote melanoma, NSCLC and breast cancer, respectively.[14, 15, 16] However, other pathways involved in copper's oncogenic roles are still under investigation.