Submitted by 29PiecesOfSilver t3_yqxoei in science
Zouden t1_iwb8s6j wrote
Reply to comment by [deleted] in In a first, doctors treat fatal genetic disease before birth by 29PiecesOfSilver
All genes are inherited the same way.
The difference between a recessive or dominant disorder is down to the actual function of the protein encoded by the gene in question; this in turn determines whether a loss of one copy of a gene (remember we have two of each) is sufficient to cause a problem. In many cases, losing function of one gene isn't a big deal because we have the other as a backup. Only when you lose two does disease occur. We call that recessive.
With dominant mutations, losing one is enough to be problematic. This is common in genes that encode for structural proteins, where you need every bit to work correctly.
An interesting case is the sickle-cell mutation of the hemoglobin gene. One copy of the mutation confers resistance to malaria, but two copies causes sickle-cell anaemia. The malaria resistance is a dominant trait, while sickle-cell anaemia is recessive.
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