Narrator:       This is Science Today. For decades, cancer researchers have known that a gene called p53 plays an important role in tumor suppression. Recently, a team of veterinary and human medicine researchers at the University of California, Davis, identified a protein that appears to play a key role in the formation of lymphoma and other tumors by inhibiting the p53 gene.

Chen:             So, what we like to do is to design molecule to get rid of this particular protein. Theoretically, we can kill the cancer cell.

Narrator:       Dr. Xinbin Chen says this protein represses p53 expression in both humans and dogs.

Chen:             Genetically, they're really close. The dog is really unique and it has very similar phenotype cancer-wise, both in treatment and the disease etiology.

Narrator:       Chen says the hope is that this newly identified protein, called RNPC1, can be a potential target for diagnosing and treating lymphoma in humans and dogs. For Science Today, I'm Larissa Branin.