All about Huntington's Disease
By Jordan Taylor
What is Huntington's Disease?
Huntington's Disease is a brain disorder that affects a person's ability to think, talk, and move.
The disease destroys cells in the basal ganglia, the part of the brain that controls movement, emotion, and cognitive ability. HD is caused by a mutation in a gene on chromosome 4. The job of its protein product, huntingtin, is to direct the delivery of small packages (vesicles containing important molecules) to the outside of the cell.
How do you people get Huntington's Disease ?
Huntington's disease is inherited in an autosomal dominant pattern. This means that everyone who inherits the faulty gene will eventually get the disease. A parent with a mutation in the HD gene has a 50 percent chance of passing the disease to their children.
Huntington chromsome