Mechanisms and consequences of chromosome mis-segregation and aneuploidy

Research in my lab focuses in two major areas: (i) the mechanics and dynamics of mitosis and the mitotic apparatus; (ii) the causes and consequences of aneuploidy in vertebrate cells.

In this talk, I will discuss some of our findings on the mechanisms that cause aneuploidy in cancer and non-transformed cells and will show how we now use this knowledge to study how changes in chromosome number affect the fidelity of mitosis and cell proliferation in general.

I will present our recent finding that aneuploidy promotes chromosome mis-segregation and confers chromosome-specific phenotypes in human primary and cancer cells. Moreover, I will show data illustrating how aneuploidy can confer a selective advantage to cells grown under stressful environmental conditions.