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MMIxCALz JOURNA field and Smith, 1955), and eluted. Following starch electrophoresis the haemoglobin fractions themselves were eluted. On measuring the colour of the eluates it was found that the abnormal component formed 28% of the total haemoglobin. The proportion of haemoglobin A2 (Kunkel and Wallenius, 1955) Huisman obliged us by testing the solubility of our patient's haemoglobin by a salting-out technique; he also found it to be normal. We are grateful to Dr. Huisman for his permission to quote that the abnormal component of this haemoglobin moves on chromatography (Huisman and Prins, 1955) between haemoglobins S and C, whereas haemoglobin C moves between haemoglobins A and S, and to Dr. Itano for informing us of differences seen on open boundary electrophoresis between the haemoglobin of our patient and mixtures of haemoglobins A + S and A + G respectively.Our patient was born a Hindu of the Khashtri caste in the Mianwali District, Pakistan. He is 27 years old and is now a citizen of India temporarily resident in London. He is not anaemic and there is nothing remarkable in his blood picture, excepting a slight eosinophilia. The osmotic fragility of his red cells is within normal limits. By the kindness of Dr. Ishwar Chandar we have examined the blood of our patient's parents and of one brother and one sister. The mother's haemoglobin consisted of haemoglobin A and of a component moving more slowly than haemoglobin A, but faster than haemoglobin S or D. The other three bloods contained haemoglobin A only.New haemoglobins are allotted letters which are in general in alphabetical order of discovery (Statement on Hemoglobin Nomenclature, 1953).

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In this research, we will examine the expression of Fibulin-4 in aortic wall to find out its role in aortic dissection development. The samples of aortic wall were obtained from 10 patients operated for acute ascending aortic dissection and five patients for chronic ascending aortic dissection. Another 15 pieces of samples from patients who had coronary artery bypass were as controls. The aortic samples were stained with aldehyde magenta dyeing to evaluate the arrangement of elastic fibers. The Fibulin-4 protein and mRNA expression were both determined by Western blot and realtime quantitative polymerase chain reaction. Compared with the control group, both in acute and chronic ascending aortic dissection, elastic fiber fragments increased and the expression of fibulin-4 protein significantly decreased (P= 0.045 < 0.05). The level of fibulin-4 mRNA decreased in acute ascending aortic dissection (P= 0.034 < 0.05), while it increased in chronic ascending aortic dissection (P=0.004 < 0.05). The increased amounts of elastic fiber fragments were negatively correlated with the expression of fibulin-4 mRNA in acute ascending aortic dissection. In conclusion, in aortic wall of ascending aortic dissection, the expression of fibulin-4 protein decreased and the expression of fibulin-4 mRNA was abnormal. Fibulin-4 may play an important role in the pathogenesis of aortic dissection.