What is Cystic Fibrosis? Cystic Fibrosis, or CF as it is commonly called, is a disease caused by an inherited genetic defect. As such, it is not contagious and there is no risk of "catching" CF from another person with CF.  About 1 in 23 people in the United States carry at least one defective gene, which makes it the most common genetic defects of its severity in the United States. (copied from: http://web.tampabay.rr.com/corrinespride/what_is.htm).

Several times during this semester I will discuss CF since understanding the disease requires knowledge of genes, mutations, proteins and protein systhesis, membrane function, genetics, and signal transduction - much of what we will cover in Cell and Molecular Biology! To begin to understand the scope of the disease and our understanding of it, browse the information that is maintained in various websites by following the links below. There will be no questions/answers associated with this exercise.

• Cystic Fibrosis Information  - maintained by Norma Kennedy Plourde of New Brunswick, Canada.
• MedlinePlus: Cystic Fibrosis - U.S. National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health
• Cystic Fibrosis Mutation Data Base - compiled with information collected by the Cystic Fibrosis Genetic Analysis Consortium.

9/22/04 Copyright (C) 2004, Jonathan Monroe, monroejd@jmu.edu. All rights reserved.
URL: http://csm.jmu.edu/biology/courses/bio220/aotw1.html