What happens in Duchenne muscular dystrophy?
In Duchenne muscular dystrophy an exon, or exons are deleted which interfere with the rest of the gene being pieced together. In our example, exon 50 illustrates this: Exon 49 can not join up with exon 51, which prevents the rest of the exons being assembled. For the dystrophin protein to work it must have both ends of the protein. Therefore, this mutation results in a completely non-functional dystrophin protein and the severe symptoms of Duchenne muscular dystrophy.
