Ligneous conjunctivitis is a rare and unusual form of chronic homozygous G r A point mutation was identified in plasminogen exon 7 at position 780 leading to an amino acid pseudomembranous conjunctivitis that usually starts in early infancy. The disease may be associated with pseudoexchange (Arg216 r His). Her healthy sister and her healthy parents were heterozygous for this mutation. The secon...

A Bangladeshi family is described in which the genes for both hemoglobin E (Hb E) and pyrimidine 5' nucleotidase deficiency are segregating. An individual homozygous for both these conditions has a severe hemolytic anemia, whereas family members who are homozygous for Hb E are asymptomatic and those homozygous for pyrimidine 5' nucleotidase deficiency have the mild hemolytic anemia that is char...

We present a patient with acromesomelic chondrodysplasia and genital anomalies caused by a novel homozygous mutation in BMPR1B, the gene coding for bone morphogenetic protein receptor 1B. The 16 year old girl, the offspring of a multiconsanguinous family, showed a severe form of limb malformation consisting of aplasia of the fibula, severe brachydactyly, ulnar deviation of the hands, and fusion...

Autosomal recessive juvenile parkinsonism (AR-JP) is a familial levodoparesponsive parkinsonism resulting from Lewy body negative degeneration of nigral neurons in the zona compacta of the substantia nigra (1-4). The first proposal for a distinct clinical entity with recessively inherited parkinsonism was made in Japan and was termed "paralysis agitans with marked diurnal fluctuations of sympto...

Mutations at abnormal spindle result in abnormally long and wavy microtubules in the meiotic spindles of males. Some of these spindles have a single pole and take the form of unopposed hemi-spindles. Unfertilised eggs produced by homozygous asp females may have either no nuclei, or a small number of large nuclei, consistent with there also being an effect upon female meiosis. Such eggs also dis...

Prokineticin 2 (Prok2) or prokineticin-receptor2 (Prok-R2) gene mutations are associated with Kallmann syndrome (KS). We describe a new homozygous mutation of Prok-R2 gene in a man displaying KS with an apparent reversal of hypogonadism. The proband, offspring of consanguineous parents, presented at age 19 years with absent puberty, no sense of smell, low testosterone and gonadotrophin levels. ...

The pathogenesis of type 2 diabetes is characterized by two major features: peripheral insulin resistance and impaired insulin secretion from pancreatic β cells (1, 2). The application of transgenic mouse technology to the study of diabetes has been extensively reviewed (3). Here, I review the application of a complementary approach, gene knockout technology, to the problem of understanding ins...

Sickle cell disease (SCD) is one of the commonest severe inherited disorders, but specific treatments are lacking and the pathophysiology remains unclear. Affected individuals account for well over 250,000 births yearly, mostly in the Tropics, the USA, and the Caribbean, also in Northern Europe as well. Incidence in the UK amounts to around 12-15,000 individuals and is increasing, with approxim...

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES In this retrospective, single center, cohort study we assessed the risk of pregnancy-related venous thromboembolism (VTE) in women belonging to a large number of families identified because of a symptomatic proband with single identified factor V Leiden mutation. DESIGN AND METHODS Female family members who had experienced at least one full-term pregnancy were enroll...

We report on two brothers with visual impairment, and non-syndromic alopecia in the elder proband. The parents were first-degree Pakistani cousins. Whole exome sequencing of the elder brother and parents, followed by Sanger sequencing of all four family members, led to the identification of the variants responsible for the two phenotypes. One variant was a homozygous nonsense variant in the inh...