Go to JCI Insight
  • About
  • Editors
  • Consulting Editors
  • For authors
  • Publication ethics
  • Publication alerts by email
  • Advertising
  • Job board
  • Contact
  • Clinical Research and Public Health
  • Current issue
  • Past issues
  • By specialty
    • COVID-19
    • Cardiology
    • Gastroenterology
    • Immunology
    • Metabolism
    • Nephrology
    • Neuroscience
    • Oncology
    • Pulmonology
    • Vascular biology
    • All ...
  • Videos
    • Conversations with Giants in Medicine
    • Video Abstracts
  • Reviews
    • View all reviews ...
    • Complement Biology and Therapeutics (May 2025)
    • Evolving insights into MASLD and MASH pathogenesis and treatment (Apr 2025)
    • Microbiome in Health and Disease (Feb 2025)
    • Substance Use Disorders (Oct 2024)
    • Clonal Hematopoiesis (Oct 2024)
    • Sex Differences in Medicine (Sep 2024)
    • Vascular Malformations (Apr 2024)
    • View all review series ...
  • Viewpoint
  • Collections
    • In-Press Preview
    • Clinical Research and Public Health
    • Research Letters
    • Letters to the Editor
    • Editorials
    • Commentaries
    • Editor's notes
    • Reviews
    • Viewpoints
    • 100th anniversary
    • Top read articles

  • Current issue
  • Past issues
  • Specialties
  • Reviews
  • Review series
  • Conversations with Giants in Medicine
  • Video Abstracts
  • In-Press Preview
  • Clinical Research and Public Health
  • Research Letters
  • Letters to the Editor
  • Editorials
  • Commentaries
  • Editor's notes
  • Reviews
  • Viewpoints
  • 100th anniversary
  • Top read articles
  • About
  • Editors
  • Consulting Editors
  • For authors
  • Publication ethics
  • Publication alerts by email
  • Advertising
  • Job board
  • Contact
α-Thalassemia in the American Negro
Elias Schwartz, Jean Atwater
Elias Schwartz, Jean Atwater
Published February 1, 1972
Citation Information: J Clin Invest. 1972;51(2):412-418. https://doi.org/10.1172/JCI106827.
View: Text | PDF
Research Article

α-Thalassemia in the American Negro

  • Text
  • PDF
Abstract

In Italian and Chinese patients with the α-thalassemia syndromes the production of α-chain of normal hemoglobin is decreased relative to that of β-chain in reticulocytes. In this study the relative rates of α- and β-chain synthesis were determined in members of three Negro families with α-thalassemia. Two of the families had members with hemoglobin H disease and α-thalassemia trait, while the mother of several children with α-thalassemia trait in the third family was doubly heterozygous for α-thalassemia and an α-chain mutant. The α/β ratios of globin synthesis in the patients with hemoglobin H disease and α-thalassemia trait indicated less severe biochemical defects in the peripheral blood than those previously determined in Italian and Chinese patients. In the third family, there was a heterogeneity of expression of the gene for α-thalassemia, including patients with normal red cell indices and synthesis ratios. These findings differ from those previously described in patients with α-thalassemia from other racial groups. Hydrops fetalis due to homozygous α-thalassemia may not occur in the Negro because of the relatively mild thalassemic defect.

Authors

Elias Schwartz, Jean Atwater

×

Full Text PDF

Download PDF (914.92 KB)

Copyright © 2025 American Society for Clinical Investigation
ISSN: 0021-9738 (print), 1558-8238 (online)

Sign up for email alerts