Facts about Colour Blindness

An Overview

Colour blindness can be simply defined as difficulties in identifying certain colours including blue, green and red. It is a type of genetic disease, where an individual finds difficulties in differentiating the colours with shades. This syndrome is also called a colour vision problem or colour vision deficiency.

An English chemist named John Dalton discovered Colour blindness in the year 1798. During his discovery, he was suffering from colour blindness and based on his own experience he wrote and published his first article about colour blindness. Colour blindness is also called Daltonism, which is named after its discoverer – John Dalton.

Monochromacy and Dichromacy are the two different types of colour blindness.

1. Monochromacy type of disorder is observed when two or three types of cone pigments are absent or damaged.
2. Dichromacy type of disorder is observed when only one of the cone pigments is absent or damaged.

Explore more Colour blindness

Colour blindness is mainly caused when one or more colour cone cells are absent or not functioning and not able to detect different colours. These cones are the cells of the retina, which detect the colour light.

There are more interesting facts about colour blindness, which have been listed below:

Facts about Colour blindness

Fact- No – 1

The factors responsible for this genetic disorder may be the use of tobacco, intake of alcohol, side effects of drugs, damage or any injury caused to the brain or eye or to the nerve cells and other inherited disorders.

Fact- No – 2

According to studies and medical records, the most common type of inherited colour blindness is red and green colour blindness.

Fact- No – 3

The Ishihara Plate test is one of the most widely used by doctors for testing the presence of colour blindness disorder.

Fact- No – 4

Colour blindness is a disease present on the X chromosome. It is a genetic disorder and affects males mostly.

Fact- No – 5

Colour blindness is not an eye-related disorder. It is a hereditary disorder, which is transferred from mother to her son on the 23rd or the sex chromosome.

Fact- No – 6

Newborn babies are colour blind as they can see only black and white colours, Their colour vision improves slowly and by the age of 6 to 7 months, they can see and enjoy the attractive colours.

Fact- No – 7

Patients with colour blind syndrome face many difficulties in their daily life. They may face difficulties in differentiating between pulses, driving a car, selecting clothes and much more.

Fact- No – 8

There is no complete cure for this genetic disorder. There are some designed lenses and glasses, which work effectively and help patients to identify the correct colour shades.

Fact- No – 9

Colour blindness is more common in males than in females. This is mainly because the colour vision deficiency is encoded on the X sex chromosome.

Also Refer: Chromosomal abnormalities

Fact- No – 10

An individual suffering from monochromacy colour blindness will find difficulties in identifying colours like red, blue and green, which results in total colour blindness. Whereas, individuals suffering from dichromacy colour blindness will find difficulties in identifying colours like blue and yellow, which results in limited colour vision.

These were a few interesting and amazing facts about colour blindness. To know more about colour blindness, other related topics and important questions, keep visiting our website at BYJU’S Biology.