A sibship is reported, including four female children, two of which MZ twins, all affected by retinoblastoma (the lesion being bilateral in three of them, and unilateral in a fourth one). The literature on the heredity of the condition is considered; the latter does not appear to be inherited as a regular dominant. Finally its genetic interpretation in the observed sibship is considered.

A description is made of a Brazilian family of white ancestry in which five individuals presented the fibrous dysplasia of the jaws known as cherubism. The information obtained involves seven generations in a total of 75 individuals. 23 of these were examined by the authors and a report about a deceased person was confirmed by photograph. The affection in this family is probably conditioned by an autosomal dominant gene with variable expressivity.

Clinical and chromosomal studies of a case of gonadal dysgenesis. The patient presented primary amenorrhea, rudimentary uterus, ipoplastic tubes and gonadad streak. No Barr bodies or drumsticks were found, and the chromosome analysis revealed a mosaic of the type XO/X + centric fragment. The pertinent literature is reviewed, and attention is drawn to the possible existence of a secretion of the steroid type in the Leydig-like cells present in the gonadal streak.

A sibship is described three sibs of which being carriers respectively of occipital meningocele, craniorachischisis and Klippel-Feil Syndrome. The last two sibs presented malformations of the heart and the digestive and genitourinary apparatuses. Genetic and anatomo-pathologic considerations.

The Authors report on a case of congenital anorchidism, confirmed by laparatomy, with negative sexual chromatin and an XY karyotype. One of his two sisters, with primary amenorrhea, presented marked hypoplasia of the genital tract, positive sexual chromatin and in 3% of the cells with 2 chromatine corpuscles, XO/XX/XXX karyotype. The presence in the same family of two cases of gonadal dysgenesis appears to have occurred by mere chance.

After a brief introduction on the genetic aspects of serum Cholinesterase, the Authors describe two familial cases of subjects homozygous for the atypical gene of Cholinesterase, who had severe apnoea following anesthesia.

37 DZ and 12 MZ twin pairs underwent a clinical and ECG heart examination. As to their zygosity, it is suggested that a concurrent similar clinical finding, very similar ECG and a mean intrapair difference of corresponding unipolar chest lead waves d ≤ 1.5 definitely support monozygosity.

Paired analysis of the ECG curves shows that the difference between MZ and DZ twins is best characterized by Tv1-6 and, to a certain extent, by Rv1-6. The same applies — in partial agreement with Mathers et al. — for PQ and QTc intervals.

Considering the intrapair differences in both MZ and DZ twins, it was found that they tend to increase in the course of one cardiac cycle, thus indicating a gradual prevalence of peristatic factors.

Phenotypic and gene frequencies determination of the Gc-system in 103 Italian subjects (Rome). Phenotypes: Gc 1-1, 56.31%; Gc 2-2, 5.82%; Gc 2-1, 37.87%. Genes: Gc1, 0.7525; Gc2, 0.2475. Comparison with the data for Europe and other continents. The phenotypic frequencies have been projected on a system of triangular coordinates.

The results are presented of a study of ulnar loops in complete or partial symmetrical formulae, in all possible combinations, in a sample of 200 families taken at random in the population of Montevideo.

Some partial formulae not only appear in a significantly higher proportion when both parents have them, and in a smaller amount when they lack them, but also seem to be inherited in a higher degree than the theoretical expectancy of the combined chances of the patterns they are made up of.

The authors' conclusions is that there seems to be a basic influence of factors determining the inheritance of independent patterns, plus a second one, resulting from the meeting of some patterns to give a more remarkable genetic effect for the inheritance of partial formulae.

A case of a female newborn, followed up to the 9th month of life, presenting a clinical picture of multiple malformations, typical of trisomy-18, is reported by the AA.: microcephaly, low set of ears, micrognaty, ogival palate, superabunding skin in the neck, simian crease, typical hands attitude, luxation of the right hip, severe neurological symptomatology with the characteristic rigidity and, finally, an extremely severe mental defect.

Growth has always been very poor; death occurred at the 9th month of life.

Chromosome research, done with two cultures of capillary blood, revealed the presence of two lines of normal and trisomy-18 cells in similar percentage.

The literature concerning the subject is examined and discussed.

A case of probably MZ twin girls is reported, one of which presenting a serious gonadal hypoplasia, macroschelia and a number of slight malformations, while the other appeared perfectly normal. Both twins presented positive sex-chromatine and a normal karyotype, i. e. 44 A + XX.

After a review of twin cases of the « rudimentary gonad syndrome » — which may differ as to its origin, according to the various cases — the present case, the anomalies exhibited by one of the twins are probably the result of the action of a number of noxae, in the course of embryological or fetal life.

Blood samples from five hundred and ninety five individuals belonging to Indore district of west Madhya Pradesh were tested for ABO blood groups, and two hundred and ninety three of them were tested for the sickle-cell trait.

The investigated groups include: the Kadve Kulmi, the Khati, the Rami Mali, the Balai, the Bhil and a mixed sample of various castes. The aforesaid groups, within the district, are found to be homogeneous, as far as the ABO blood groups distributions are concerned. Frequencies for the O, A and B genes have been found to be 0.5251, 0.1587 and 0.3162, respectively, in the pooled data.

Sickle-cell trait has been detected in the Balai, the Charmakar or Chamar and the Bhil.

1. The author has worked out a new systematics for the interdigital patterns of the palm based on the building up of digital triradius 3 and the extension of main line C with the following types of pattern as result: U (ulnar loops), R (radial loops), O (open-field pattern) and V (vestiges — incomplete patterns or “special” patterns).

2. A significant difference in frequency for the pattern distribution between the two hands has been found for U, R as well as for O-patterns (U-patterns and O-patterns appear with 6.5 respectively 14.3% higher frequency on the left hand, while R-patterns appear with 20.2% higher frequency on the right hand.).

3. The pattern distribution does not show any difference between the two sexes.

4. Calculations of correlations in tetrachoric tables have shown a strong mother-child correlation on the 99.9% level for U-pattern set against R-pattern for both the right and the left hand (r = 0.39-0.43).

Two DZ monoplacental twins are reported, one affected by mongolism and the other normal. Chromosome examination in the former indicated trisomy 21, while the latter presented a mosaicism consisting, at the age of 13 days, in 70% normal and 30% 21-trisomic cells; at the age of 5 months, in 95% normal and 5% trisomic cells; while, at the age of one year, all the cells appeared to be normal.

The possibility of mosaicism, and, according to clinical and hematological findings, that of feto-fetal blood transfusion are excluded.

The hypothesis is suggested of a progressive loss of the reproductive capacity of « chimaera » of abnormal lymphocytes.

The South Indian populations differ from one another for the frequency of hairy ear rims, tragus hair and hairs on the ear lobe. The difference in the age of onset is not very striking. Whether they are due to the same gene, or genes, or to independent genes, cannot be answered until detailed pedigree studies are made.

Genetics in the Soviet Union has undergone a profound and long crisis, involving the realm of Biological Sciences and Science and Culture as a whole.

This was not merely due to the emergence of neo-Lamarckian Michurinism, claiming the inheritance of acquired characters to be possible and necessary, and the genotype to be plastic and shakable, especially under particular environmental and physiological conditions: this could have been the object of scientific discussions, probably of a controversy, too, just as one century ago, but would have hardly involved matters of principle and of method in Scientific Research, nor would the controversy have degenerated, absurdly giving rise to a “ Western ” and a “ Soviet Science ”.

Two closely connected factors, equally important and equally witnessing a reject of the principles underlying the scientific method, may be considered as the actual source of this partition of Science, namely:

i) The assumption of a primacy of Ideology, thus making Science be submitted to it, and scientific theories be held right or wrong, according to their fitting or not ideological ones;

ii) Violent political pressures and administrative coercion on scientific thought, and on scientists themselves.

Along with such matters of principle, matters of method in research planning and the formulation of results made it impossible to reach a plain evaluation of Lysenko's theories and results.

Now that a normal athmosphere appears to have been re-established for the development of genetic research in the Soviet Union, rejecting, or ignoring the whole of Lysenko's work, could prove just as wrong as Lysenko's reject of Classic Genetics.