Translocation

Translocation is a form of structural abnormality of the chromosomes.


 * During translocation some part of one chromosome is transfered to another one.
 * It is very important if the translocation is balanced or unbalacted. Balanced means that two chromosomes just exchange their parts but the number of chromosomes stay the same (46 chromosomes).
 * Fortunately - typical place of break is near to the centromere, we usually lost just a small parts of the acrocentric chromosomes. There are not so many important genes coded by these parts. So carrier can normally survive this cytogenetic change.
 * Unfortunately the problem occur during the fertilization. Carrier start to produce unbalanced gametes. It is very important because that leads to abnormalities in offsprings. Because they can receive changed chromosome from the carrier and miss some important genes.

Types of translocation

 * 1) reciprocal - translocation between two chromosomes ("A segment" goes to "B chromosome" and "B segment" goes to "A chromosome")
 * 2) robertsonian - translocation of two acrocentric chromosomes



Related articles

 * Chromosome abnormalities