A 20-year-old female presents for an infertility workup. She has never had a menstrual period. She is short with a broad chest, webbed neck, and low-set ears. It is demonstrated that she has an abnormal karyotype.The cause of the woman's abnormal karyotype is which one of the following?: (A) Maternal nondisjunction, (B) Paternal nondisjunction, (C) Both maternal and paternal nondisjunction, (D) Either maternal or paternal nondisjunction
Answer is D. Monosomy X (Turner syndrome) can be as a result of either maternal nondisjunction (an egg is created lacking an X chromosome, whereas another egg has two X chromosomes) or paternal nondisjunction (a sperm lacks the X chromosome, whereas another sperm contains both the X and Y chromosomes). Turner syndrome is not caused by translocation events, either reciprocal or Robertsonian (recall that Robertsonian translocations only occur among acrocentric chromosomes, and the X chromosome if not acrocentric).