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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2019 Sep 6.
Published in final edited form as: Cell. 2018 Sep 6;174(6):1347–1360. doi: 10.1016/j.cell.2018.08.027

Figure 1. Chromosomal instability in cancer.

Figure 1.

Multiple defects found in cancer can lead to both numerical and structural chromosomal abnormalities, which manifest as errors in chromosome segregation during mitosis. These errors lead to aneuploidy, karyotype heterogeneity, as well as the formation of micronuclei. Chromosomes enclosed in micronuclei are subjected to increased DNA damage and can become exposed to the cytoplasm after micronuclear envelope rupture. This mechanism has been proposed to promote massive structural chromosomal rearrangements, known as chromothripsis, the formation of extrachromosomal DNA as well as double minutes, which can be subjected to strong selective pressures and be present in hundreds of copies per cell. Furthermore, the presence of cytoplasmic double-stranded DNA (dsDNA) promotes inflammatory signaling through the activation of the cytosolic dsDNA sensing, cGAS-STING pathway.