Bogar Alcaraz Silva
17/September/2010
PBL1 - sickle cells disease. A study case.
Zowemy- Biology Class
Introduction:
Sickle cell anemia is the most common genetic condition in England. One baby in every 2,000 is born with the condition. The condition affects males and females equally. The disease is caused by a point mutation on the gene the helps making hemoglobin. Hemoglobin is protein that is found in red blood cells. The hemoglobin is divided by two type’s normal and clumped hemoglobin.
ESSAY
The cells disease is a serious disease in which the body makes sickle-shaped red blood cells. “Sickle-shaped” means that the red blood cells are shaped like a "C." The main objectives of biology in this disease are the completely study of the cell disease the causes that it have, and how the biology can help in a certain way the cell disease.
The cells disease has many sciences studying the problem of cell disease and they are:
· Chemistry: Study of the reaction of the cell disease.
· Biology: Study all the living things in the cell disease.
· Microbiology: it checks that the cell disease doesn’t have bacteria.
· Medicine: Can help with the problems that have the cell disease.
· Pathology: It helps to discover the causes of the cell disease.
Those sciences are very helpful to the problem of cell disease, but we need to mention the biology branches to complete all the cell disease studies:
· Mathematics
· Computer science
· Biology (research)
· Chemistry
The most important branch and science is “Biology” because is involved by the research, the cellular base with the genetic cells obviously and also the living things. This is why the biology is the most important science because it is related with this in the cell disease.
We need to know the principles levels of organization to understand better the problems and what causes to the cell disease:
· Cell: is affecting the organism (cell disease) and it can`t continue working well.
· Tissue: it stops the main functions of the cells organism disease.
· Organism: It stops de living thing cells.
The problem with this disease is the hemoglobin that is a protein that is found in the red blood cells. It gathering of 4 globular protein subunit forming a tetrahedral arrangement. The hemoglobin proteins chain into a set of alpha-helix structural segments connected together in a globing gold arrangement.
It acts transporting mechanism for oxygen and carbon dioxide into the red blood cells. During deoxygenation, healthy hemoglobin molecules should smoothly rearrange themselves into a different shape.
However, in people with sickle cell anemia, his shape and texture of the blood cells can change and the smooth rearrangement does not occur due to the mutated gene. Instead, the hemoglobin inside the blood cells clumps together into solid structures.
· Normal Hemoglobin
· Clumped Hemoglobin
But the other problem is that the level of protein structure is number 4 so it has
Tridimensional shape presented by the union of two or more polypeptide chains.
Proteins make up about 15 percent of the total body mass and are involved in nearly every function of the body. The shape of a protein is determinant for their proper function. The main functions of proteins are: structural, movement, defense, catalytic, transportation and hormonal
Proteins can lose their functionality when:
· The change/lose/failure of one amino acid.
· Extreme heat and pH
There are a number of alternative treatments that can help reduce the severity and frequency of the symptoms of sickle cell anemia and prevent complications. The outlook for sickle cell anemia can be highly changeable. Some people only have mild symptoms, while others have frequent attacks of pain and experience a wide range of complications.
There have been major advances in the treatment of sickle cell anemia over the last twenty years. In the past, life-threatening complications, such as stroke or pneumonia were common, and most people with the condition would die in childhood or early adulthood.
Nowadays, following improvements in preventative treatment, many of the complications associated with sickle cell anemia can be avoided.
The average life expectancy of a person with the condition is estimated to be 53-60 years of age. It is hoped that, in the future, the life expectancy of people with sickle cell anemia will continue to increase as the effectiveness of treatments improves.
However, this mutation can also have positive effects at the whole organism level. Carriers of the sickle cell allele are resistant to malaria, because the parasites that cause this disease are killed inside sickle-shaped blood cells.
Conclusion
They are many people who ever in their all life doesn’t know that they have sickle cell anemia disease, so with the preventions and all that we know we can attend the disease and prevent the people sick with this disease in the world.
REFERENCES
Biology handouts:
· http://biculturalscience.blogspot.com/
· Lesson 1: Introduction to Biology
· Lesson 2: Levels of Organization of Matter
· Lesson 7: Proteins
· Lesson 9 Sickle Cells disease- A case study
· http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/dci/Diseases/Sca/SCA_WhatIs.html
· http://wiki.answers.com/Q/List_of_10_types_of_sciences
