**About the Editors**

#### **Antonio Facchiano**

Antonio Facchiano is an oncologist with long lasting experience in the field of new therapeutics and new diagnostic approaches in melanoma. He published several studies regarding the identifications of novel anti-angiogenic and anti-melanoma molecules, as well as studies clarifying pathogenic mechanisms controlling melanoma cells proliferation. He also identified several molecules acting as relevant diagnostic markers and therapeutic targets in melanoma, with particular focus on peptides, cytokines, ion-channels, and immune-system related molecules.

#### **Donatella Del Bufalo**

Dr Donatella Del Bufalo is a senior scientist working at the Regina Elena National Cancer Institute (Rome, Italy). During her career she focused her interest in the experimental chemotherapy of tumors and published about 110 papers demonstrating the in vitro and in vivo efficacy of several anti-neoplastic, anti-angiogenic, and epigenetic drugs, and oligonucleotide antisense as therapeutic agents able to induce apoptosis and/or autophagy in cancer cells. Dr Del Bufalo's group identified an important function for bcl-2, bcl-xL, and bcl2L10 antiapoptotic proteins in tumor progression and angiogenesis, highlighting a mechanism independent from the pro-survival functions of these proteins. Dr Del Bufalo is currently funded by the Italian Association for Cancer Research for a project "Shaping melanoma microenvironment by bcl-2: from novel mediators of tumor stroma crosstalk to new therapeutic approaches". Very recently, in collaboration with Sapienza University (Rome), Dr Del Bufalo group's identified IS21, as a new compound able to interact with bcl-2, bcl-xL, and mcl-1 proteins, and to induce in vitro and in vivo antitumoral activity.

#### **Alessandra Car`e**

Dr. Alessandra Care is a Research Director at the Italian National Health Institute where she is ` now leading the Reference Center for Gender-medicine.

She was was deeply involved since more than 30 years in basic and translational cancer studies, focusing on melanoma biology, and the functional roles played by microRNAs, exosomes, and, more recently, lipids. Since 2017, she has been working in the Oncology Unit of the Gender-specific Center looking at the functional roles of male and female specificities in all the steps going from experimental laboratory studies to patient care. As important differences have been described in cancers, including melanoma, she and her group are now including sex and gender determinants in their studies.
