The great process of revision of medicine in the light of genetics has sofar traced three main patterns in present medical thinking: normal human genetics, medical genetics, and eugenics.

The birth of genetics represents in nuce the birth of eugenics, or preventive genetics, which, on account of the study of the traits of a man and a woman, may judge of the probabilities of their children with respect to the same traits.

Eugenics makes objective and valid deductions, but one has always to rely on the responsibility of the propositi, and on auto-decision, engaging the conscience of intelligent and free beings.

1. The proportions of red haired offspring within families in which one or both parents are red haired are too high to support the hypothesis that red hair is inherited as a simple recessive trait.

2. Family data and gene frequency analysis give strong support to the hypothesis that red pigment in human hair is dominant to its absence, and is hypostatic to brown and black.

The Authors report EEG alterations found in two brothers affected by pigmentary retinopathy, syndactilia and hypoacusia, and in their relatives. The EEG resulted to be altered aspecifically in the propositi, in their mother and their two clinically healthy sisters. The father was normal. Reports on EEG alterations in patients with pigmentary retinopathy are rather frequent, while such report is rare in healthy relatives.

Analysis of the chromosomes of the proposita, who died at 10 weeks of age, revealed a D/E translocation. The child showed the following abnormalities: hypertelorism; high palate; low set, malformed ears; left paresis of facial nerve; micrognathia; hemimelia with radius aplasia on the left side; open foramen ovale; open ductus botalli; ventricel septum defect; pelvic kidney left; hypotonia of the musculature; shortened thigh-adductors; and a dorsal flexion of the first toe on both sides.

The chromosome complement of the father included both reciprocals of a translocation between a D- and E-chromosome. The chromosome number of both father and child was 2n=46.

The Authors report the results of a cytogenetical investigation on a group of 140 Down's syndrome patients: nine of them had a translocation (D/G or G/G) and four a mosaic (trisomy 21-22/apparently normal); a mongol girl had 48 chromosomes due to the presence of a small centric chromosome and 21-22 trisomy. All other patients had a regular 21-22 trisomy. Some additional morphological anomalies are described, but interpreted as being expression of the normal human karyotype's variability.

A study of the finger and palm prints and of the chromosomal patterns of 122 Down's syndrome patients, among which 9 had a D/G or a G/G translocation and 4 a mosaic, could not detect significant differences between dermatoglyphics of regular trisomic mongoloids and of the translocated ones. Mosaic cases had few Down's syndrome dermatoglyphic peculiarities, in relation with the number of the trisomic cells in the chromosomal set.

A case of mongoloid MZ twins is described. The study is completed by chromosome analysis, showing the presence of trisomy 21.

The experimental cotwin control method by means of 34 MZ pairs, of which only one cotwin of each pair suffered from typhoid disease, offered excellent opportunities to study the after effects of typhoid incidence on the anthropometric, mental and physical traits of individuals. Comparison among 56 MZ pairs reveals that typhoid brings out certain significant changes in these traits.

Increase of intelligence has already been shown, due to increased quantity of RNA. Whether or not typhoid incidence after a period of approximately 7 months influences the rapid synthesis of RNA would be a good field of biochemical investigation of immunogenetical interest.

The Authors describe the case of juvenile hypothyroidism with goiter caused by a congenital defect in the synthesis of the thyroid hormones. The picture of thyroid uptake curve, cromatographic separation of thyroid hormones in serum and of thyroid gland tissue, and the PBI concentration, suggest to include the case among the iodothyrosine dehalogenase defects. Such a defect, though very attenuate, has been found in the patient's mother too. From a genetic point of view, Authors suggest to consider both cases heterozygous expression of the defect; though in the daugther this defect is more accentuate.

Data on defective sex-linked colour vision has been reported on 1580 male subjects drawn from eight endogamous groups of Maharashtrian Brahmins. The range of variation of affected persons is between 0.00 to 8.58%, with an average of 3.97%. The ratio of deuton to proton genes is 2.54: 1.

A great deal of heterogeneity is observed in the groups investigated.

The sex-wise distribution of whorls among the offspring of various parental combinations reveals that the over-all influence of the parents on the same sex offspring is somewhat less marked. A similar tendency is noticed in case of loops and arches. There hardly seems to exist any relationship between the sex of the parents and their offspring regarding the distribution of pattern-types.