 When not bound to netrin-1, an intracellular domain of DCC is cleaved by a caspase, and induces apoptosis in a caspase-9-dependent pathway.This domain does not correspond to a known caspase recruitment motif or death sequence domain, but is required to initiate apoptosis.It has been theorized that the domain acts as a scaffold to recruit and activate caspase-9 and caspase-3.