Diverse chromosome abnormalities in squamous cell carcinomas of the skin

Short-term cultures from three invasive squamous cell carcinomas of the skin were cytogenetically analyzed. Clonal chromosome aberrations were found in all tumors. In the first case, two of three abnormal clones were related, and in the second case, two of five clones demonstrated cytogenetic similarities. Both clones detected in case 3 had a structural rearrangement in common. Several nonclonal changes were seen in all three cases in addition to the clonal aberrations. None of the rearrangements detected, clonal or nonclonal, corresponds to any of the consistently cancer-associated aberrations known from other neoplasms. The remarkably diverse karyotypic picture of the three squamous cell carcinomas, in particular the finding of unrelated clones in two of them, hints that these neoplasms may be poly-rather than monoclonal. The lack of a common cytogenetic denominator argues that if chromosomal changes are of pathogenetic importance in this tumor type, a wide variety of apparently dissimilar changes exist that are roughly equal in their capacity to malignantly transform skin epithelium.