The Nonrandomness of Chromosomal Abnormalities

Abstract

DO chromosome abnormalities in human populations arise at random? Or may they result from nonrandom processes?Several lines of evidence suggest that chromosomal errors occur in a nonrandom manner. These types of evidence are briefly examined, and new data favoring the nonrandomness of chromosomal abnormalities are presented in this paper.The strongest evidence for the nonrandomness of chromosomal errors comes from population studies in which families known to contain a member with one chromosomal abnormality have been found to harbor another with a different chromosomal aberration. Mosier et al.,1 in a buccal-mucosa survey of institutionalized retarded males, found 10 with . . .