Parasexual cycle in cultivated human somatic cells.

Somatic segregation for three different autosomes was demonstrated in two strains of human diploid fibroblasts derived from subjects known to be heterozygous for chromosomal variants. Recombinant diploid cells appeared within cultures of tetraploid clones isolted from mass cultures. Tetraploid cells regularly occur in mass cultures and within clones of diploid cells. Such a parasexual cycle (2n-->4n-->2n), with recombination of entire linkage groups, could from the basis of a beginning formal genetic analysis in man.