A paper published in Nature Communications reports that the topoisomerase II inhibitors doxorubicin and daunorubicin induce histone eviction from open chromatin. This effect was independent of the induction of DNA damage by these agents and occurred both in cancer cell lines in vitro and in acute myeloid leukaemia (AML) cells isolated from patients treated with daunorubicin. AML blasts from one patient did not express detectable levels of topoisomerase IIα, leading the authors to suggest that the cytotoxicity of daunorubicin in these cells might result from apoptosis induced by the presence of free histones as a result of histone eviction.