DCC and neoplasm: Upon stratifying gastric cancers based on defects in either DCC or UNC5C and on their relationship with tumor stage, we found that DCC alterations were consistently observed in all TNM stages with a high frequency: 10 of 16 (63 %) of stage I, 19 of 25 (76 %) of stage II, 19 of 29 (66 %) of stage III, and 10 of 13 (77 %) of stage IV cancers (Table 2).