Colorblindness

Ali Laouar and Joe Tyo

How does the person inherit it?

• 1. How does a person inherit it?

• Most color blindness is heritable, usually as simple Mendelian inheritance.

• Is it dominant or recessive?

• It is an X-linked recessive.

What are the possible genotypes of the parents?

• What are the possible genotypes of the parents?

• The genotypes would most likely be XB Xb (mother) and XB Y (father)

• Colorblindness is not a chromosomal abnormality.

How prevalent is the disease in the population?

• How prevalent is the disease in the population?

• 10% of the male population who has been tested is colorblind. Females very rarely inherit color blindness as only 0.5% of females have it.

What are the chances of a person with this disease passing the disease to their offspring?

Male Female X XY YX YXX XX XX

0% girl 0% boy

Male Female x x

Y Yx ( colorblind) Yx ( colorblind)

X Xx Xx

0% girl 100% boy

Male Female X x

Y YX Yx ( colorblind)

X XX Xx

0% girl 50% boy

Male Female X XY YX XXx Xx Xx0% girls 0% boy

Male Female X x

Y YX Yx (colorblind)

x Xx xx (colorblind)

50% girl 50% boy

Male Female x x

Y Yx ( colorblind) Yx ( colorblind)

x xx ( colorblind) xx ( colorblind)

100% girl 100% boy

X=can see color x= colorblind

Diagnosis of Color Blindness• How is color blindness

diagnosed?• Color Tests measure how well

you recognize different colors.• In one type of test, you look at

sets of colored dots and try to find a pattern like a letter or a number. The patterns you see help your eye doctor determine which colors you have trouble with and then diagnose you with color blindness if necessary.

What are the symptoms?

• The symptoms of color vision problems vary:

• You may see many colors, so you may not know that you see color differently from others.

• You may only be able to see a few shades of color, while most people can see thousands of colors.

• In some rare cases, you see only black, white, and gray

Treatment• Inherited Color Blindness is not

treatable. However there are methods of dealing with the disease and making things easier.

• Specially tinted contact lenses and eyeglasses may help you see differences between colors.

• Glasses that block glare are helpful because people with color vision problems can see differences between colors better when there is less glare and brightness. A person with color vision problems can actually see better when the lighting is not bright.

Possible treatments?

• Some studies are showing that weekly electrical stimulation of the eye muscle can improve color vision.

• High doses of vitamin A have shown promising results.

• Injections of the vitamin B Complex are also causing some improvement.

What is every day life like? What is the quality of life?

• Every day life is similar to people that can see color.

• The things that they have trouble doing involves telling what color the stop light is or kids not being able to tell crayons apart.

• In the scientific field they have trouble telling test strips apart.

• The quality of life varies depending on person, some have a perfectly normal life while others might be ridiculed at work, or school for not seeing colors.

Limitations• They have trouble telling colors

apart so they can not fly planes for the air force.

• They can have driving or dressing problems.

• They might have trouble telling if they are sunburned or if there meat is cooked.

• Career limitations in healthcare industry such as preforming surgery.

• Daily limitations such as not being able to find your red toothbrush amongst the rest of the colored toothbrushes.

Helpful Organizations

• American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO)

• American Optometric Association (AOA)

• National Eye Institute, National Institutes of Health

• Prevent Blindness America• WebMD.com• Daily strength.org- Color

Blindness Support Group

Any hope for a Cure?• Scientists at the University of Washington,

in Seattle, and the University of Florida restored normal vision to two color-blind monkeys. The technique could prove to be a safe and effective cure for color blindness and other visual disorders related to the cones in the retina in the future.

• “Although color blindness is only moderately life-altering, we have shown we can cure a cone disease in a primate and that it can be done very safely,” said Professor William Hauswirth, an ophthalmic molecular geneticist at the University of Florida. “That is extremely encouraging for the development of therapies for human cone diseases that really are blinding.”