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Aneuploidy—it's more common than you think

Nature Biotechnology volume 18, pages 715–716 (2000)Cite this article

DNA microarrays allow us to simultaneously monitor the expression level of thousands of genes within a cell under hundreds of different conditions. Recent work by Hughes and colleagues published this month in Nature Genetics1 demonstrates that this vast collection of expression data can also reveal intimate details about the underlying genomic DNA, including regions of DNA amplification or deletion and cases of aneuploidy. In addition, through their careful examination of a compendium of expression data from the baker's yeast, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, the authors make the surprising observation that aberrations in chromosomal copy number are widespread in yeast, with up to 8% of the strains tested showing some degree of aneuploidy.

This chromosome-wide expression bias suggested a case of aneuploidy in these two disparate mutant strains, which was further corroborated by hybridizing the genomic DNA of these two strains to DNA microarrays. When the authors examined genome-wide expression data from other laboratories, they found similar evidence of chromosome-specific biases suggestive of aneuploidy in some of these strains.

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Figure 1: Discovery of aneuploidy with cDNA microarrays using (A) comparative mRNA hybridization or (B) comparative DNA hybridization.

© Bob Crimi

References

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Guy Oshiro is postdoctoral associate and Elizabeth A. Winzeler is staff scientist, Genomics Institute of the Novartis Research Foundation, 3115 Merryfield Row, San Diego, 92121, CA

    Guy Oshiro & Elizabeth A. Winzeler

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  1. Guy Oshiro
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  2. Elizabeth A. Winzeler
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Oshiro, G., Winzeler, E. Aneuploidy—it's more common than you think. Nat Biotechnol 18, 715–716 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1038/77273

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