Endoreduplication (also referred to as endoreplication or endocycling) is replication of the nuclear genome in the absence of mitosis, which leads to elevated nuclear gene content and polyploidy. Endoreduplication can be understood simply as a variant form of the mitotic cell cycle (G1-S-G2-M) in which mitosis is circumvented entirely, due to modulation of cyclin-dependent kinase (CDK) activity. Examples of endoreduplication characterised in arthropod, mammalian, and plant species suggest that it is a universal developmental mechanism responsible for the differentiation and morphogenesis of cell types that fulfill an array of biological functions. While endoreduplication is often limited to specific cell types in animals, it is considerably more widespread in plants, such that polyploidy can be detected in the majority of plant tissues. Polyploidy and aneuploidy are common phenomena in cancer cells. Given that oncogenesis and endoreduplication likely involve subversion of common cell cycle regulatory mechanisms, a thorough understanding of endoreduplication may provide important insights for cancer biology.

Endoreduplicating cell types that have been studied extensively in model organisms

Endoreduplication, endomitosis and polytenization are three different processes resulting in polyploidization of a cell in a regulated manner. In endoreduplication cells skip M phase completely by exiting the mitotic cell cycle in the G₂ phase after completing the S phase several times, resulting in a mononucleated polyploid cell. The cell ends up with twice as many copies of each chromosome per repeat of the S phase. Endomitosis is a type of cell cycle variation where mitosis is initiated, but stopped during anaphase and thus cytokinesis is not completed. The cell ends up with multiple nuclei in contrast to a cell undergoing endoreduplication. Therefore depending on how far the cell progresses through mitosis, this will give rise to a mononucleated or binucleated polyploid cell. Polytenization arises with under- or overamplification of some genomic regions, creating polytene chromosomes.

Based on the wide array of cell types in which endoreduplication occurs, a variety of hypotheses have been generated to explain the functional importance of this phenomenon. Unfortunately, experimental evidence to support these conclusions is somewhat limited.

In developing plant tissues the transition from mitosis to endoreduplication often coincides with cell differentiation and morphogenesis. However it remains to be determined whether endoreduplication and polyploidy contribute to cell differentiation or vice versa. Targeted inhibition of endoreduplication in trichome progenitors results in the production of multicellular trichomes that exhibit relatively normal morphology, but ultimately dedifferentiate and undergo absorption into the leaf epidermis. This result suggests that endoreduplication and polyploidy may be required for the maintenance of cell identity.

Cell ploidy often correlates with cell size, and in some instances, disruption of endoreduplication results in diminished cell and tissue size suggesting that endoreduplication may serve as a mechanism for tissue growth. Relative to mitosis, endoreduplication does not require cytoskeletal rearrangement or the production of new cell membrane and it often occurs in cells that have already differentiated. As such it may represent an energetically efficient alternative to cell proliferation among differentiated cell types that can no longer afford to undergo mitosis. While evidence establishing a connection between ploidy and tissue size is prevalent in the literature, contrary examples also exist.

Endoreduplication is commonly observed in cells responsible for the nourishment and protection of oocytes and embryos. It has been suggested that increased gene copy number might allow for the mass production of proteins required to meet the metabolic demands of embryogenesis and early development. Consistent with this notion, mutation of the Myc oncogene in Drosophila follicle cells results in reduced endoreduplication and abortive oogenesis. However, reduction of endoreduplication in maize endosperm has limited effect on the accumulation of starch and storage proteins, suggesting that the nutritional requirements of the developing embryo may involve the nucleotides that comprise the polyploid genome rather than the proteins it encodes.

Another hypothesis is that endoreduplication buffers against DNA damage and mutation because it provides extra copies of important genes. However, this notion is purely speculative and there is limited evidence to the contrary. For example, analysis of polyploid yeast strains suggests that they are more sensitive to radiation than diploid strains.