Saturday, October 29, 2005

Link between diseases and mutations

In 2001 I did a book review for the Canadian Family Physician entitled "Genome. The autobiography of a species in 23 chapters " by author Matt Riddley. Each chapter represented a chromosome.
In todays blog I want to review only chapter 9 where the author discusses the links between disease and mutation.
Human Blood Types fall into 4 groups-A, B, AB, and 0. Types A and B are "co-dominant versions" of the same gene , with 0 being the "recessive form " of it. In the 1960's a correlation was found between blood groups and diarrhea. Children with type 0 very much susceptible to infant diarrhea (Vibrio bacterium), Type A or B only to some strains, while group AB were resistant. So powerful is this resistance that they are virtually immune to cholera. This may also explain the prevalence of Group O in Native North Americans where this bacterium is rarely found.
Another example- Sickle cell anemia is a recessive gene mutation which causes red blood cells (RBC) in hypoxic (low oxygen) conditions to assume a sickle shape. Individuals with one copy of the gene are largely resistant to malaria presumable because the malaria parasite cannot invade the sickle shape of the RBC to complete the human portion of its cell cycle. In homozygous individuals i.e. with 2 copies, the anemia may be fatal. Not surprisingly one finds the sickle-cell mutated gene common in parts of West Africa were malaria is endemic, and in African -Americans presumably exported with the slave trade.
Third example- Cystic Fibrosis and typhoid fever. The mutated gene that causes this disease is located on chromosome 7. People with only one copy of the CFTR gene do not get cystic fibrosis but they are immune to the dysentery and fever caused by the Salmonella bacterium. Apparently the typhoid bacillus needs the normal version of the CFTR gene to invade the intestinal cells. We all know the fate of individuals with 2 genes.
Riddley cites other examples of the relation of genetic variants (mutations ) to resistance to infection. It would appear our genome is a written record of the endemic and pandemics we have experienced. Riddley goes so far as to propose that the Human Genome Project is founded upon a fallacy when he states "The projects declared aim is to publish the average or 'consensus' sequences of 200 different people. My question is: What will the genetic map look like a century from now?

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