“…The viral E6 and E7 oncogenes are both regularly expressed in HPV-positive tumor cells and are necessary to maintain their transformed phenotype (zur Hausen, 2002). E6 exhibits antiapoptotic potential in various experimental settings (Pan and Griep, 1995;Sto¨ppler et al, 1998;Thomas and Banks, 1998;AguilarLemarroy et al, 2002;Filippova et al, 2004;Yuan et al, 2005), and the targeted inhibition of endogenous E6 activity induced apoptosis in HPV-positive cancer cells (Butz et al, 2000(Butz et al, , 2003Hengstermann et al, 2005;Kelley et al, 2005). Thus, the continuous presence of E6 is important for the viability of HPV-positive cancer cells, defining E6 as a promising target for therapeutic intervention.…”