The causes and consequences of polyploidy in normal development and cancer

T Davoli, T De Lange - Annual review of cell and developmental …, 2011 - annualreviews.org
T Davoli, T De Lange
Annual review of cell and developmental biology, 2011annualreviews.org
Although nearly all mammalian species are diploid, whole-genome duplications occur in
select mammalian tissues as part of normal development. Such programmed
polyploidization involves changes in the regulatory pathways that normally maintain the
diploid state of the mammalian genome. Unscheduled whole-genome duplications, which
lead primarily to tetraploid cells, also take place in a substantial fraction of human tumors
and have been proposed to constitute an important step in the development of cancer …
Although nearly all mammalian species are diploid, whole-genome duplications occur in select mammalian tissues as part of normal development. Such programmed polyploidization involves changes in the regulatory pathways that normally maintain the diploid state of the mammalian genome. Unscheduled whole-genome duplications, which lead primarily to tetraploid cells, also take place in a substantial fraction of human tumors and have been proposed to constitute an important step in the development of cancer aneuploidy. The origins of these polyploidization events and their consequences for tumor progression are explored in this review.
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