Retinoblastoma Essay

Retinoblastoma is a rare cancer disease that affects the retina with a malignant tumor normally affecting young children from infants to small children around the age of five and rarely affecting adults. Retinoblastoma is autosomal dominant, meaning it's present on the non-sex chromosomes and because it is dominant, and Mendel’s Law of Dominance claims that some genes are dominant and are over the recessive genes which prevents the recessive gene from being present. Retinoblastoma forms during pregnancy when the tumor grows within the tissue that would be developing for the eyes. Retinoblastoma traces to one locus which includes chromosome 13 which codes for the RB1 tumor suppressor gene. RB1 codes by 928 amino acids and would be mutated by deletion, insertion, missense, or nonsense, which are all known as a point mutation. If RB1 becomes mutated, it would be unable to suppress the tumors that would be developing in the body thus allowing for cancerous cells to spread and develop over most areas of the body and affect the genotype. Retinoblastoma affects one
Survival rates of retinoblastoma being cured is 95% and are only able to save 70%-80% of the real eye. Since retinoblastoma is autosomal dominant, if one parent were to have this gene, the child has a 50% chance to inherit the gene and is present in their genotype because of Mendel’s Law of Dominance and Law of Independent Assortment, which involves the various gene combinations. Those who have retinoblastoma, about 60% of the cases were non hereditary and diagnosed at age two, and the other 40% results from their hereditary and would be affected with multiple tumors in one or both eyes. Most parents with children with retinoblastoma need to pay high expenses to allow for their children to receive the treatment they need, and very supporting for the child when being