Heredity in viroses has to be considered (i) from the standpoint of the specific virus which, like any living organism, presents heredity, variability and mutation, and (ii) from the standpoint of the human host, where the receptive conditions may be genetically controlled.

The heredity of disposition to poliomyelitis is also witnessed by the results of Gedda's twin clinical method as well as by the proportionality between the consanguinity ratio and the ratio of concordance of the infection in the family.

The heredity of disposition to trachoma has been studied in 775 families from Eritrea, the disease having been examined in parents and children. Statistic and genealogic analysis shows the existence of a disposition. The mating of an affected father to a nonaffected mother does not alter the frequency of the affection in the children, as compared to the case of the children of both nonaffected parents. On the other hand the affected father makes the frequency of the affection significantly rise in the children when mated to an affected mother. Such a behaviour is explained through a more frequent disposition in the children of parents both affected by one and the same disposition.

The study of the sample through the dimensions of the sibship, showing a constant nonaffected-affected ratio, independently from the above dimensions, also leads to assuming the existence of a disposition. This sharply contrasts with the epidemiologic concept of a higher risk, the higher the number of sibs.

In a family with 528 members, in 7 generations, 162 (47% of the 347 examined patients) showed a Waardenburg syndrome. The frequencies of the different signs are as follows: lateral displacement of the canthi interni and lacrimal puncta: 76%; hyperplasia of the nose root: 54%; hyperplasia of the eyebrows: 52%; deafness: 9%; heterochromia of the iris: 9%; partial albinism: 6%.

A genetic study on a sample of patients suffering from essential hypertension has confirmed the inheritance of this disease. In single individuals and in families, especially in young female subjects, the same hereditary load often leads to the appearance of a vascular headache. In some family groups, the vascular headache seems to occur more frequently than in others. This fact suggests the hypothesis of a possible existence of factors able to favour the appearance of this trouble. After considering the data collected from the study of three generations of relatives of the hypertensive propositi, it seems possible to state that the hereditary load usually develops into vascular headache in young age, and hypertension in old age, while headache tends to disappear. This pattern, usually frequent, is not quite constant, and, in the same families, it is possible to find subjects affected with hypertension only, and others (also in old age) with headache only. Therefore, it is possible to think that the abovementioned diseases are pleiotropically determined by the same genetic factors, occurring in different ways, according to age, sex and other genotypic factors. The statistical analysis of the collected data suggests that such disease be inherited as a dominant monomeric autosomal trait, with a higher penetrance in old than in young people. Headache seems to prefer female subjects, while hypertension does not show any sex-preference.

A study on the relationships between rheumatic valvular heart diseases and the ABO blood groups has been carried-out on a sample of 1,047 patients distributed, according to their origin, in 10 different areas. A first analysis, accomplished on the basis of this distribution, indicates a highly significant negative association of rheumatic valvular affections with group O, in comparison with all other blood group phenotypes, both singularly or totally considered. It is also shown that no significant heterogeneity exists among the areas. Subsequently, a similar procedure is applied by distributing all the patients according to sex, received therapy (medical or sugical) and previous anamnesis (acute rheumatic fever, repeated acute tonsillitis, no signs). This second part confirms the association of the condition with A, B and AB blood groups, but no heterogeneity is demonstrated among the different classes of the second distribution.

The frequency of twin births in Japan was calculated with the aid of the births statistics of the Japanese government for 1955-1961, and compared with the corresponding data in Western Germany. The results are follows:

1. The frequency of twin births in Japan is 0.64% of all births, while in Germany it is of 1.15%. The ratio of MZ to DZ twins is 63%: 37% in Japan and 32%: 68% in Germany.

2. The present results are mainly in agreement with two previous reports by Komai (1936) and Inouye (1956).

3. The frequency of MZ twin births in Japan is almost the same as in Germany, while the frequency of DZ twin births in Germany is about three times higher than in Japan. This study confirms the hypothesis that the difference of the frequency of twin births between Japan and Germany is only due to the difference of the frequency of DZ twin births.

Among 2,005 Swedish men the percentage of “non-tasters” for PTC is 18.4 ± 0.9 and by 1,051 women 12.8 ± 1.0. The difference is 5.6 ± 1.4%. The difference of “non-tasters” between women who are nulliparae (437) and others (614) is 19.5 — 8.1 = 11.4 ± 2.2%.

1. The author has worked-out a new system of finger-prints analysis through bringing together the types of pattern of the various fingers to a total qualitative value of the following 5 types: A-pattern 2.3%, AL-pattern 3.5%, L-pattern 61.8%, LW-pattern 21.4%, W-pattern 11.0%.

2. Calculations of frequency have shown that sex difference does not exist with respect to the various types of total qualitative value.

3. Mother/child calculations of correlation in tetrachoric tables have given the following results:

a) L/W: χ2 = 34.38; r = 0.46 ± 0.06;

b) A, AL, L/LW, W: χ2 = 27.38; r = 0.31 ± 0.05;

c) L/LW: χ2 = 3.75; r = 0.13 ± 0.07.

The new quantitative evaluation of palmar dermatoglyphics is a radical modification of the metric method already proposed by the A. (1961). The change makes it extremely simple to apply, and it is not at all liable to varying interpretations from one scientist to another. This modification consists in plotting the circumference passing through the three nonaligned points represented by the triradii a, b, d (c has been intentionally excluded, for it is often absent or merely rudimentary). The end of each main line may thus be expressed by the angle at the centre measured (in an anti-clockwise direction for right hands and vice versa for left hands) from the triradius a to the point of intersection between the main line under study and the circumference plotted as described.

The coefficient r of correlation has been calculated in parent-parent, father-child, mother-child and sib-sib pairs, for the ends of line A and for those of line D expressed as above, and also for a number of other metric features resulting from the construction of the circumference. Very small nonsignificant values of r have been found in the case of the parent-parent pairs; in the other cases, on the contrary, the r values were as a rule statistically significant, showing the heritability of the features in question.

Both palm prints of 75 ♂ and 73 ♀ unrelated Maharashtrian students aged 8-18 have been collected and analysed according to Cummins & Midlo's methodology. The results are tabulated and discussed.

They concern the principal main line formulae and their terminations at Lines D, C, B, A; the distribution of the axial triradius, as well as the frequencies of whorls, loops, arches, vestiges and open-fields in the hypothenar, thenar and in the interdigital areas.

The distribution of c-d and direct a-d intertriradial measurements has been investigated in the plantar dermatoglyphic surface of 100 males and 100 females from the Panjabi Brahman population.

The meam values of both c-d and measurements appear to be smaller in females and ow the rigt sides.

The ‘t’ test reveals that bilateral variation is statistically significant in the c-d measurements, both when the sides are combined or separate.

Sex differences too are statistically highly significant in the c-d and a-d measurements, both when the rights and lefts are studied individually or jointly.