Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Research Highlight
  • Published:

Oncogenes

One-man band

Nature Reviews Cancer volume 3, page 714 (2003)Cite this article

Overexpression of MYC is known to lead to gene amplifications and fusions, which could be caused by defective DSB repair. To test this hypothesis, the authors generated normal human foreskin fibroblasts that contained a regulatable MYC gene. Overexpression of MYC was shown to increase the number of γ-H2AX foci — a marker of DSB repair. But does MYC cause the DSBs themselves or prevent their repair?

This was investigated by irradiating cells to introduce DSBs either in the presence or absence of MYC. Following this treatment, the number of γ-H2AX foci increased, regardless of whether or not MYC was expressed. However, in cells that did not express MYC, the γ-H2AX foci disappeared with an hour of treatment; in cells expressing MYC, the foci remained for up to 3 hours, indicating that MYC does not affect the generation of DSBs, but does interfere with their repair.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on SpringerLink
  • Instant access to the full article PDF.

USD 39.95

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

ORIGINAL RESEARCH PAPER

  1. Karlsson, A. et al. Defective double-strand DNA break repair and chromosomal translocations by MYC overexpression. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 100, 9974–9979 (2003)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Authors
  1. Emma Greenwood
    View author publications

    Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar

Related links

Related links

WEB SITE

Dean Felsher's lab

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Greenwood, E. One-man band. Nat Rev Cancer 3, 714 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrc1195

Download citation

  • Issue date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nrc1195

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing