Over 2,000,000 American's are carriers of the genetic trait for Thalassemia, a fatal blood It is also the most common single gene disorder in the world. This disease whichprevents normal hemoglobin production in the blood, is curently uncurable, and untilrecently only let its victim live no longer then the first decade of their life. Thalassemia is aserious genetic disease that afflicts children and adults all around the world.In order to understand Thalassemia, one must understand the physiolgy of blood. Blood, the carrier of nutrition and waste in our bodies, contains a protein calledhemoglobin. Hemoglobin is solely responsible for the transport of oxygen from the lungsto cells through out the body. It is imperative that hemoglobin is readily avaible in theblood to ensure cells can function properly. There are three types of hemoglobin. One isHemoglobin A, which is the most prevalent in adults. Hemoglobin A is composed of twoalpha globins and two beta globins. There are two mior hemoglobins names A2 and F. Hemoglobin A2 is composed of 2 alpha and two delta globins. Finally, hemoglobin F,predominatntly found in infants, is composed of 2 alpha globins and 2 gamma globins. In anormal human being the globins that make up hemoglobin would be produced at certaintimes in a human's life. Initially, while it is a fetus, the human would contain high amountsof hemoglobin F, and thus be producing alpha and gamma globins in majority. Howeveronce a baby is born, gamma globin production drops and is countered by beta globinproduction, thus allowing hemoglobin A to be created. Delta globins also increase once ahuman is growing but they are rather insignificantly low in numbers.In a thalassemia patient, the genes that code for the production of certain globlinsare either mutated or destroyed. This misinformation in the genetic code, leads to anabnormal ratio of globins leaving too many unpaired globins and the expression ofthalassemia. ...
