DMC1 and cancer: Recent studies evaluating meiotic genes, including DMC1, found expression of these genes in melanoma, lymphoma, cervical, breast and colon cancers.44, 45, 46 Expression of DMC1 was previously shown to increase in response to IR in various cancer cell types, with a proposed role of decreasing ploidy in cells that have undergone mitotic catastrophe.45 Although non-neoplastic aneuploidy cells would usually undergo apoptosis, cancer cells evade cell death and utilize survival mechanisms, potentially involving DMC1, to return to a sustainable ploidy state.