Risks to offspring of consanguineous marriage: we need straight, not crooked thinking

Risks to offspring of consanguineous marriage: we need straight, not crooked thinking.

1 have responded to the recurrent debates in the UK media about the pros and cons of cousin marriage? 2–5 He would surely have examined the key facts (Table 1), as well as exposing any dishonest tricks of an argument; he would also have pointed out that it is wise to avoid language which alienates some participants. A senior UK scientist recently spoke about first cousin marriages 2 , and refer...

The relation between consanguineous marriage and mental retardation of the offspring

Orientation Tuning—A Crooked Path to the Straight and Narrow

Neurons in visual cortex are selective for the orientation of a visual stimulus, while the receptive fields of their thalamic input are circular. Cortical orientation selectivity arises from the organization of both thalamic input and local cortical circuits. In this issue of Neuron, Schummers and colleagues provide evidence that the local circuit mechanisms contributing to orientation selectiv...

The straight truth: measuring observer attention to the crooked nose.

OBJECTIVES/HYPOTHESIS Quantify attentional distraction to crooked noses pre- and postoperatively as compared with normal noses by using an established metric of attention in a pilot study. STUDY DESIGN Prospective, randomized, controlled experiment with crossover. METHODS An eye-tracker system was used to record the eye-movement patterns, called scanpaths, of 40 naive observers gazing at pi...

Hearing Impairments in Consanguineous Marriage

Consanguineous marriage is strongly favored in many large human populations. In the most parts of south Asia, consanguineous marriage account for 20%  to over 50% of the general population. The effect of consanguinity on hereditary deafness has been well studied and documented. Many authors have suggested that approximately one half  of sensory neural hearing loss in children can be attributed ...