Evening star., 1950-06-30
New Findings Reported
In Study of HemophiIio
Disease Found in Females,
Hitherto Held impossible
By Thomos r. Henry

s"'"S'to ssSu tuPV9SiUtS
BY Thomos r. Henry
CHAPEL HILL. N. c.. June So.-Hemo-
philia. the bleeding disease which has
been the curse Of Europe's royal families
for the last three generations and has
altered the course Of world history, has
been produced in dogs ut the University
OF North Carolina Medical School here.
This opens up for the first time the pos
sibility Of systematic study Of this dreaded
hereditary failure Of the blood to clot and
already is throwing new light on the
malady.
A notable finding Of Drs. Kenneth NJ.
Brinkhouse and John d. Graham Is that
1t can occur in females. hitherto thought
impossible. No such case ever has been
known in the human race where the NAL
ady Is quite frequent. It is due to the lack
OF some obscure substance in the blood
plaSma which Is essential before the nor
NAL clotting mechanism viii come into
action.
Fatal Strain Traced.
The fatal strain In the European royal
family can be traced definitely to Queen
Victoria and the statement often has
been made that 1t started with her be-
cause of some hereditary mutation, pos
sibly due to chance exposure TO q cosmic
ray shower. The North Carolina doctors
have some evidence. however, that II had
appeared at least generation earlier.
1t is transmitted through the female
line. One Of Victoria's sons was q hemo-
phile and died in early manhood Of the
malady. Through her daughters the he
reditary taint was transmitted to other
royal lines especially the Russian. The
aftiiction Of the Czarovitch played q ma
jor part In the background Of the Soviet
revolution. A granddaughter brought
the disease into the Spanish royal family.
hemophilic line soon dies out. The
talnt. however. apparently reappears
quite frequently as q result Of genetic
mutations. Somewhere In the human
makeup there Is an insecure genetic link
age. Most large hospitals have one or two
cases on their records The disease
seems most prevalent in the German
and Swiss Alps. There are isolated com
munities where most Of the men are
hemophilic.> From these there has been
considerable immigration to the United
States.
The disease appeared in the dogs by a
similar mutation to that which takes
place in humans It behaves exactly as In
men. Perhaps 1t is not rare in CANNES.
but 1t Is not perpetuated because the male
puppies seldom live long enough to pass
1t on through their daughters.
Animals Kept Alive.
In this case the animals have been kept
alive by frequent blood or plasma trans
fusions and the bleeder males mated with
transmitter females. This would be quite
unlikely to take place in humans. From
such matings come both male and female
bleeders.
This throws out the theory that there
Is something In the female constitution
which prevents it. Among the treatments
suggested has been massive doses Of fe-
male sex hormones Another suggestion
has been that a double dose Of the ge-
netic taint in females was incompatible
with life. The dogs will be used TO study
means Of combating the disease, which
apparently Is bound to recur again and
again In the human family.
Water from the Antarctic Ocean,
creeping northward along the deep sea
bottom. forms a thin sheet under the
greatest depth of the Caribbean.
This has just been reported to the
American Geophysical Union by DR.. M. ].
Pollack Of the Woods Hole Oceanograpic
Institute. as result Of soundings made
by the institutes research ship Atlantis
in the Brownson Deep.
This region, which extends 220 miles In
an east-west direction north and east Of
Puerto Rico, has an average bottom depth
Of about miles. The Atlantis shaft
made and analyzed water samples from
various depths.
At the lowest depths there were notable
differences in temperature and snlinity
which could not be explained by depths
and pressure alone. They, however. are
what would be expected Of Antarctic
water mixed slightly with the deepest
water Of the North Atlantic.
This northward flow Of water from the
south polar ocean has been known for
some years. the report says. It creeps
sluggishly along the bottom Of the South
Atlantic in sheet never more than 1000
feet thick and always at depths below
$4,000 feet. Northward increase Of tenn
peratures and salinity are quite irregular.
The Atlantis findings indicate probably
the northern limit Of this southern water
sheet and DR.. Pollack deduces that II en-.
ters the Brownson Deep from the east.