Welcome back to Science You Can Bring Home To Mom! This month, in honor of pride month, we are discussing the science behind gender and biological sex. Just like many other attributes of the human brain, our common understanding of gender is rife with oversimplification and misunderstanding. But digging a little deeper can help us learn to empathize with others and understand ourselves better. As a human attribute, gender is inherently biopsychosocial—it’s influenced by biological, psychological, and social factors. And each of these paradigms is far more complex than it may seem on the surface. Next week, we’ll dissect some…
Comments closedTag: Genetic disorders
Last week we saw how the complex interplay of genetics and environment has impacted the inheritance of sickle-cell anemia. This week, I want to talk about a special subset of inherited diseases called sex-linked disorders. One of the most common sex-linked disorders is Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD), a debilitating muscular disorder linked to the X-chromosome. Sex-linked disorders, like DMD, come from genes in the sex chromosomes (X and Y in humans). Sex chromosomes are responsible for determining an individual’s biological sex, XX for female, XY for male (although there are other less common combinations that come from chromosomal aberrations—we’ll talk…
Comments closed
Last week, I discussed the genetic basis of cancer risk, specifically breast cancer. This week I want to start talking about direct genetic diseases, starting with a disease that has an interesting connection with malaria: sickle-cell anemia. Sickle-cell anemia affects millions of people worldwide, and it is particularly common in people with African or Mediterranean ancestry. Individuals with two sickle-cell disease (SCD) genes (one from their mother and one from their father) develop sickle-cell anemia, which causes their red blood cells to become warped and “sickle” shaped. These sickle cells are stiff and they tend to build up in the…
Comments closed