Chromosomal Aberrations and Cancer — NEET Biology
✅ Asked in NEET 2016As you will learn in Chapter 5, one DNA helix runs continuously from one end to the other in each chromatid, in a highly supercoiled form. Therefore loss (deletions) or gain (insertion/duplication) of a segment of DNA, result in alteration in chromosomes. Since genes are known to be located on chromosomes, alteration in chromosomes results in abnormalities or aberrations. Chromosomal aberrations are commonly observed in cancer cells.
NTA tests whether students understand that deletions, insertions, and duplications of DNA segments cause chromosomal aberrations, which are frequently observed in cancer cells. The common student mistake is confusing different types of aberrations—many think deletion and insertion are the same or forget that duplication is a gain type aberration. Remember: deletions are loss of DNA segments (harmful), while insertions and duplications represent gain of DNA (also abnormal). Cancer cells commonly show these chromosomal alterations, making this a high-yield concept. Since genes sit on chromosomes, any structural change directly affects gene function and cell behavior.
The mechanism that causes a gene to move from one linkage group to another is called (NEET 2016 Phase 2)
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