Question

thalassemia and sickle cell anemia are caused due to a problem in globin molecule synthesis

Answer 1

Thalassemia is an inherited blood disorder in which the body makes an abnormal form of hemoglobin. Hemoglobin is the protein molecule in red blood cells that carries oxygen. The disorder results in excessive destruction of red blood cells, which leads to anemia. Anemia is a condition in which your body doesn’t have enough normal, healthy red blood cells. Thalassemia is inherited, meaning that at least one of your parents must be a carrier of the disease. It’s caused by either a genetic mutation or a deletion of certain key gene fragments.
Thalassemia occurs when there’s an abnormality or mutation in one of the genes involved in hemoglobin production. You inherit this genetic defect from your parents.

If only one of your parents is a carrier for thalassemia, you may develop a form of the disease known as thalassemia minor. If this occurs, you probably won’t have symptoms, but you’ll be a carrier of the disease. Some people with thalassemia minor do develop minor symptoms.

If both of your parents are carriers of thalassemia, you have a greater chance of inheriting a more serious form of the disease.


Sickle cell anemia, or sickle cell disease (SCD), is a genetic disease of the red blood cells (RBCs). Normally, RBCs are shaped like discs, which give them the flexibility to travel through even the smallest blood vessels. However, with this disease, the RBC’s have an abnormal crescent shape resembling a sickle. This makes them sticky and rigid and prone to getting trapped in small vessels, which blocks blood from reaching different parts of the body. This can cause pain and tissue damage.
The basic cause of sickle cell anemia involves hemoglobin, a component of the red cells in the blood. The hemoglobin molecules in each red blood cell carry oxygen from the lungs to organs and tissues and then bring back carbon dioxide for removal by the lungs. In sickle cell anemia, this process is disrupted. After the hemoglobin molecules give up their oxygen, some of them may cluster together and form long, rod-like structures that become stiff and assume a sickle shape and gene mutation is also leads to inherited one gene for hemoglobin S from each parent.