39 People Whose Genetics Made Them Unique

Coloboma is an eye abnormality that usually occurs before birth. It’s characterized by missing tissue inside the structures of the eye. As a result, the eye might have a "key-hole" appearance of the pupil, but that doesn’t mean it leads to vision loss. It can only occur if the retinal coloboma is so large that it affects the optical nerve. Such cases, unfortunately, cannot be helped with glasses or contact lenses.

It’s not entirely clear why this person has an enlarged thumb. But in recent years, a soaring numbers of people are having overworked digits due to smartphone use. In fact, an overworked thumb can be up to 15 percent larger on one's dominant hand than on the other.

Hand therapist Nicola Goldsmith says that “thumb swiping could add to muscle length and bulk in the muscles.” As a result, you could notice some localized changes in your thumbs, especially if you can part with your phone for long periods of time.

Polydactyly is a condition that means that someone is born with one or more extra fingers or toes. That means that you can have extra digits either on one of your hands and feet or both. This condition is often genetic and is also known as someone having supernumerary (more than the normal amount of) digits.

However, polydactyly can vary from person to person. Some people have fully functioning extra fingers or toes. Others have partially formed digits that might contain some bones but no joints. While still others might have just a small lump of soft tissue, also known as a nubbin (if you're a fan of the TV show Friends, then you'll remember that Chandler Bing said he had a nubbin).

This could be a case of simple syndactily, which is a medical term for webbed or conjoined fingers and toes. It’s among the most common malformations and affects 1 in 2,000-3,000 kids every year.

According to the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, the condition occurs while a baby is still in the womb. During the 7th to 8th week of an infant’s development, fingers and toes separate. Well-developed fingers and toes are crucial in early childhood when one is rapidly developing motor skills.

Cases like this may require an assessment of joint hypermobility. That’s what the Beighton scoring system is for. It measures fingers, elbows, knees, and spine according to a 9-point scale. The test for fingers looks like this: rest the palm of the hand and forearm on a surface with the palm side down and fingers out. Can your fifth finger be lifted and bent at the knuckle beyond 90 degrees? If so, you should get a point. Keep measuring the rest of the body parts to see the final score.

It’s quite likely that this person has a persistent pupillary membrane (PPM,) which is a condition of the eye that has a strand of tissue crossing the pupil. The fetus uses the pupillary membrane as a source of blood supply for the lens. It wastes away after birth between the age of 4 to 8 weeks. Only large strands may disrupt the vision and a minimal amount of membrane tissue is considered non-harmful.

The uvula, the piece of dangling flesh which resembles a teardrop, is an important part of your mouth. It lubricates the inside and directs nasal secretions to your throat. It’s also important for speaking. The uvula moves the soft palate to the back of your throat so words and sounds can be articulated well.

This case may be a bifid uvula, or a cleft uvula, which refers to a split or forked uvula. It can cause severely nasal-sounding speech and other non-harmful symptoms.

Sectoral or partial heterochromia refers to the eye condition that causes two completely different colors in one iris. Most people born with it have no symptoms but on rare occasions, it can be the sign of a syndrome. People with heterochromia go on living life normally and no treatment is needed. Some people like it for aesthetic reasons and prefer to have a little quirkiness.

This person likely has a quite rare congenital condition where the fingers are not formed properly, or some are missing altogether. Symbrachydactyly occurs when the baby is still in the womb. Texas Children’s Hospital claims that “it is likely caused by a lack of blood flow to the tissue.” Even if the condition cannot be passed down through a family, it can be linked with some genetic syndromes.

Knee hyperextension happens when a knee joint is forced beyond 180 degrees in one direction, which is a normal range. It can happen to anyone, but is quite common in athletes who play contact sports like soccer or football. When one gets constant impacts on the front of the knee, the joint starts extending further than its normal range. Yoga is said to stabilize knee ligaments by strengthening the muscles.

Even if this particular condition is unknown, some people do, in fact, have small holes in their ears. They’re called preauricular pits and are usually found in the front of the ear, towards the face. In fact, the hole is connected to an unusual sinus tract under the skin. While in most cases, it isn't harmful, it can get infected for some people.

It's nearly impossible to say whether this person has a condition based on this one picture. But it resembles a very common disease named alopecia. Approximately 6.8 million people in the United States and 147 million worldwide have or will develop alopecia areata at some point in their lives.

Alopecia is an immune disease characterized by spot baldness that appears as a result of the immune system attacking one’s own hair follicles. Some people lose some areas of hair, while others may lose a lot, but it really depends on a person. There’s no cure for alopecia, but immunotherapy and some medications can help to grow back some of the hair.

Triphalangeal thumb (TPT) is a congenitalmalformation where the thumb has three phalanges instead of two. The extra phalangeal bone can vary in size from that of a small pebble to a size comparable to the phalanges in non-thumb digits.

You've probably felt that tingling cold getting into your fingers on a freezing winter day. While usually, the feeling fades away once you get warm, some people are left with white and numb digits. It may happen as a result of Raynaud’s disease. It is a blood vessel disorder characterized by limited blood flow in cold temperatures or even stressful situations. According to Health Partners, up to 10% of the population has some symptoms and there’s no apparent reason why it happens. Others have it as a result of another condition, such as an autoimmune disease.

Some people are just born more flexible, while others may carry an actual condition. One of them is called Ehlers-Danlos syndrome and it’s a group of disorders that affect the skin, joints, and blood vessels. The overly stretchy skin may bruise easily. EDS is caused by a glitch in the genes and the proteins that connect the tissue aren’t made in the usual way.

The condition is known as sectoral heterochromia. It means that only a portion of the iris of one eye has a different color than the rest of the iris of that eye. The condition typically doesn’t have any other significant symptoms or problems. But how captivating it is to look at!

This condition condition falls under a category of deformities called Polydactyly. Podiatrist Francisco J. Oliva told Health: “It’s genetic in origin and can have a distant family trait, although this isn’t always the case.” Some seek surgical correction while others decide to live with it.

When the embryological cells differentiate to form toes, the cell has an error which leads to an extra toe. “Some forms of polydactyly can be seen as a totally separate, extra toe, but in this case the two toes never separated,” said Podiatrist Francisco J. Oliva about the rare deformity in TLC's show "My Feet Are Killing Me."

He inherited this trait from his mother, and she inherited it from her father. For decades they thought it was just a quirk of their family tree, but recently our newborn daughter screened positive for a primary immunodeficiency. Changes to the FOXN1 gene cause this along with low T cells and other problems with the thymus. Children grow out of the immunodeficient side by age 2, but the nails stay like this for life. They're called "spoon nails."