Radiation

Radiation damages DNA in a couple of different ways. First, radiation can
break the strands of the double helix by knocking out bonds between sugars
and phosphates (see Chapter 6 for a review of how the strands are put
together). If only one strand is broken, the damage is easily repaired. But
when two strands are broken, large parts of the chromosome can be lost;
these kinds of losses can affect cancer cells (see Chapter 14) and cause birth
defects