Brooke Greenberg

{{Short description|First documented case of neotenic complex syndrome (1993–2013)}}

{{Infobox person

| name = Brooke Greenberg

| image = Brooke Greenberg.jpg

| alt =

| caption =

| birth_name = Brooke Megan Greenberg

| birth_date = {{Birth date|1993|1|8}}

| birth_place = Baltimore, Maryland, United States

| death_date = {{death date and age|2013|10|24|1993|1|5}}

| death_cause = Bronchomalacia

| death_place = Baltimore, Maryland, United States

| other_names =

| known_for = Syndrome X

}}

Brooke Megan Greenberg (January 8, 1993 – October 24, 2013) was an American woman who became famous for being the first documented case of neotenic complex syndrome. Throughout her life of 20 years, she remained physically and cognitively similar to a toddler despite her increasing age. She was about {{convert|30|inch|cm|abbr=on}} tall, weighed about {{convert|16|lb|abbr=on}}, and had an estimated mental age of nine months to one year.

Birth and early life

Brooke was born on January 8, 1993,{{cite news|last=Bethge |first=Philip |url=http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/brooke-the-immortal-an-american-child-may-hold-secrets-to-aging-a-725798.html |title=Brooke the Immortal: An American Child May Hold Secrets to Aging |newspaper=Der Spiegel |date=October 29, 2010 |access-date=May 30, 2014}}{{cite web|url=https://www.foxnews.com/story/the-curious-case-of-brooke-greenberg-16-year-old-has-the-body-and-mind-of-a-toddler/ |title=The Curious Case of Brooke Greenberg: 16-Year-Old Has the Body and Mind of a Toddler |publisher=Fox News |date=August 7, 2009 |access-date=May 30, 2014}} to parents Howard and Melanie Greenberg{{cite AV media| url= http://video.foxnews.com/v/3937480/frozen-in-time | title= Frozen in Time| medium= TV news program| work=Fox & Friends| date= August 2009|publisher= republished online on May 3, 2011| accessdate= January 20, 2016}} at Sinai Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland. She was delivered by caesarean section, one month before her due date due to "intermittent growth",{{cite AV media| url= https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwTsRzbgBOU |title=Girl Frozen In Time| medium=TV Documentary| publisher=TLC | date= August 9, 2009| website=uploaded to YouTube| accessdate= January 20, 2016}} weighing just four pounds (1.8 kg). She was born with anterior hip dislocation, a condition that caused her legs to be swiveled upward toward her shoulders; it was corrected surgically. Otherwise, Brooke appeared to be a typical infant.{{cite news| url= https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna9778227 |title= A child frozen in time| first= Sara |last= James| work= NBC News| date= October 23, 2005}} She was the third of four girls born to her parents.

In her first six years, she went through a series of unexplained medical emergencies from which she recovered. She had seven perforated stomach ulcers. She also had a seizure. This was followed by what was later diagnosed as a stroke; weeks later, no damage was detected. At age five, Brooke had a mass in her brain that caused her to go into a deep sleep (after confirmation that it was not a coma) for 14 days. The doctors diagnosed the mass as a brain tumor. She later awoke, and physicians found no tumor present. Brooke's pediatrician, Dr. Lawrence Pakula, stated that the source of her sudden illness remains a mystery.

During an interview on the talk show Katie, her father stated that, between the ages of four and five, she stopped growing.{{cite web|author=Greenfield, Beth |url=http://shine.yahoo.com/parenting/toddler-20-years-old-forever-young-due-baffling-175300753.html |title='Toddler' is 20 Years Old, and Forever Young, Due to Baffling Medical Condition |website= Yahoo.com |date=January 11, 2013 |access-date=January 12, 2013}} Child Frozen In Time, a documentary about Brooke, was first broadcast on TLC on August 9, 2009.{{cite web| url= http://www.mahalo.com/brooke-greenberg| title= Brooke Greenberg| website= Mahalo.com| access-date= January 20, 2009| archive-date= June 16, 2016| archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20160616233917/http://www.mahalo.com/brooke-greenberg| url-status= dead}}

Unexplained condition

Over several years, the Greenbergs visited many specialists, looking for an explanation for their daughter's strange condition, yet there was no diagnosis of any known genetic syndrome or chromosomal abnormality.{{Cite journal| last1 = Walker | first1 = R.| last2 = Pakula | first2 = L.| last3 = Sutcliffe | first3 = M.| last4 = Kruk | first4 = P.| last5 = Graakjaer | first5 = J.| last6 = Shay | first6 = J.| title = A case study of "disorganized development" and its possible relevance to genetic determinants of aging| journal = Mechanisms of Ageing and Development| volume = 130| issue = 5| pages = 350–356| year = 2009| pmid = 19428454| doi = 10.1016/j.mad.2009.02.003| s2cid = 11036362}} In 2001, when Dateline documented Brooke at eight years of age, she was still the size of a six-month-old infant, weighing just 13 lb (5.9 kg) at 30 inches (76 cm) tall. The family still had no explanation. Brooke's mother Melanie said, "They [the specialists] just said she'll catch up. Then we went to the nutritionist, the endocrinologist. We tried the growth hormone…". The growth hormone treatment had no effect. Howard, Brooke's father, said, "I mean, she did not put on an ounce, or she did not grow an inch... That's when I knew there was a problem." After the growth hormone administration failed, the doctors, unable to diagnose a known condition, named her condition Syndrome X.

The Greenbergs made many visits to nearby Johns Hopkins Children's Center and even took Brooke to New York's Mount Sinai Hospital, searching for information about their daughter's condition. When geneticists sequenced Greenberg's DNA, they found that the genes associated with the premature aging diseases were normal, unlike the mutated versions in patients with Werner syndrome and progeria.{{cite news|url= https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17379-teenage-baby-may-lack-master-ageing-gene.html |title= Teenage 'baby' may lack master ageing gene| first= Andy |last= Coghlan| work=New Scientist| date= June 25, 2009}}

Medical studies

In 2006, Richard Walker, an endocrine physiologist at the University of South Florida College of Medicine, said that Brooke's body was not developing as a coordinated unit but as independent parts that were out of synchronization.{{cite web |url=http://www.dovepress.com/journal-editor--clinical-interventions-in-aging-eic4 |title=Clinical Interventions in Aging|year=2009 |publisher=Dove Medical Press Ltd. |access-date=July 25, 2010 }}{{Failed verification|date=December 2015}}{{Cite web|url=https://abcnews.go.com/Health/maryland-20-year-dies-aged/story?id=20712718|title=20-Year-Old Dies Never Having Aged|date=October 29, 2013|website=ABC News|language=en|access-date=April 10, 2018}}{{Cite web|url=https://abcnews.go.com/Health/40-year-child-benjamin-button-children-grow-age/story?id=12724960|title=Forever Young: Benjamin Button Children Never Grow or Age|date=January 21, 2011|website=ABC News|language=en|access-date=April 10, 2018}} She was never diagnosed with any known genetic disorder or chromosomal abnormality that would help explain why.{{ cite news |url=https://abcnews.go.com/2020/Health/story?id=7880954&page=1 |title=Doctors Baffled, Intrigued by Girl Who Doesn't Age |last=Brown |first=Bob |date=June 23, 2006 |work=Health |publisher=ABC News |access-date=June 27, 2009}} Her telomeres seemed to be shortening at the normal rate.

In 2009, Walker said, "There've been very minimal changes in Brooke's brain … Various parts of her body, rather than all being at the same stage, seem to be disconnected." Walker noted that Brooke's brain, for example, was not much more mature than that of a newborn infant. He estimated her mental age at around nine months to a year old. Brooke could make gestures and recognize sounds but could not speak. Her bones were like those of a ten-year-old, and she still had her baby teeth, which had an estimated developmental age of about eight years. Said Walker, "We think that Brooke's condition presents us with a unique opportunity to understand the process of aging."{{cite web |url=http://www.nationalledger.com/lifestyle/article_272631718.shtml |title=Brooke Greenberg Frozen in Time - 17-Year Old 'Toddler' |work=National Ledger |first=Christi |last=Hall |date=May 10, 2010 |access-date=May 12, 2010 |archive-date=May 13, 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100513012848/http://www.nationalledger.com/lifestyle/article_272631718.shtml |url-status=dead }} "Different parts of her body are developing at different rates, as if they were not a unit but parts of separate organisms," Walker explained.

Death

Brooke Greenberg died on October 24, 2013, at the Herman and Walter Samuelson Children's Hospital at Sinai Medical Center in Baltimore, the same hospital where she was born. Her funeral service took place on October 27, 2013, and that same morning, she was buried at Baltimore Hebrew Cemetery - Berrymans Lane, in Reisterstown, Maryland.[https://web.archive.org/web/20131205061324/http://www.sollevinson.com/notice.php?lr=loc&id=24879 Brooke Megan Greenberg], obituary and condolences at the Sol Levinson & Bros., Inc. site, stored at the Wayback Machine The cause of her death was bronchomalacia, a medical condition usually occurring in children, which results in difficulty breathing due to weak cartilage in the walls of the bronchial tubes.{{cite web |url=http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/obituaries/bs-md-brooke-greenberg-20131030,0,6177724.story |first=Nayana |last=Davis |title=Brooke Greenberg, 20, who suffered from rare genetic condition, dies |work=The Baltimore Sun |date=October 30, 2013 |access-date=October 31, 2013 |archive-date=November 2, 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131102034252/http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/obituaries/bs-md-brooke-greenberg-20131030,0,6177724.story |url-status=dead }}

Comparable cases

In May 2015, it was reported that Layla Qualls of Oklahoma looked as if she was 9 or 10 months old, but was 3 years old. She was among seven children worldwide with Syndrome X that are being studied by researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles. She died on January 7, 2020, at the age of 7.

In their ongoing research they found that the blood of Syndrome X children appears to age normally.{{cite web| url=https://www.foxnews.com/health/oklahoma-girls-rare-syndrome-prevents-her-from-aging/ |title= Oklahoma girl's rare syndrome prevents her from aging |publisher=Fox News |date=May 8, 2015 |access-date=May 9, 2015}} Layla was also featured in a TLC documentary titled "The Girls Who Don't Age". This documentary aired July 18, 2016 on TLC.{{cite AV media| url= https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U-OZcxShY_M |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211221/U-OZcxShY_M |archive-date=2021-12-21 |url-status=live|title=Girls Who Don't Age| medium=TV Documentary| publisher=TLC | date= July 20, 2016| website=uploaded to YouTube| accessdate= July 20, 2016}}{{cbignore}}

In July 2016, it was reported that Alyssa Pennington of New Mexico looks as if she is five years old, but is 12 years old. She is another Syndrome X case.{{cite web| url=http://krqe.com/2016/07/19/new-mexico-girl-one-of-six-with-rare-genetic-disorder/ |title= New Mexico girl one of six with rare genetic disorder |publisher=KRQE News 13 |date=July 19, 2016 |access-date=July 20, 2016}}

Another case that has been reported in July 2016 is Jenifer Sandoval of Colorado. Although she looks as if she is four years old, she is 22 years old.{{cite web| url=http://www.barcroft.tv/tlc-girls-who-dont-age-america |title= The Real Peter Pans: The Girls Who Don't Age |publisher=Barcroft Media Ltd |date=July 16, 2016 |access-date=July 16, 2016}}

Blood tissue from five other female Syndrome X cases (whose average age was 6.3 years) turned out to be age-appropriate{{Cite journal | pmid = 25991677| year = 2015| last1 = Walker| first1 = R. F.| title = Epigenetic age analysis of children who seem to evade aging| journal = Aging| last2 = Liu| first2 = J. S.| last3 = Peters| first3 = B. A.| last4 = Ritz| first4 = B. R.| last5 = Wu| first5 = T| last6 = Ophoff| first6 = R. A.| last7 = Horvath| first7 = S| volume=7| issue = 5| pages=334–9| doi=10.18632/aging.100744| pmc=4468314}} according to a biomarker of aging known as epigenetic clock. The mean epigenetic age of the five pure Syndrome X subjects was 6.7 years (standard error=1.0) which is not significantly different from the mean chronological age of 6.3 years (standard error=1.8). Notably, the oldest pure Syndrome X case had an epigenetic age of 14.5 years which was 3.2 years older than her true chronological age. It is not yet known whether the epigenetic age of other tissues is also age appropriate in these cases.

Neotenic complex syndrome

Blood samples from each of the "Syndrome X" girls were sent to Dr. Radoje Drmanac in San Francisco, who did a full genomic sequencing and found the common link shared by the girls, leading the syndrome to be renamed "neotenic complex syndrome".{{cite web|url=http://www.barcroft.tv/tlc-girls-who-dont-age-america|title=The real Peter Pans: The Girls Who Don't Age|website=Barcroft TV}}{{cite journal|title=Clinical and genetic analysis of a rare syndrome associated with neoteny|first1=Richard F|last1=Walker|first2=Serban|last2=Ciotlos|first3=Qing|last3=Mao|first4=Robert|last4=Chin|first5=Snezana|last5=Drmanac|first6=Nina|last6=Barua|first7=Misha R|last7=Agarwal|first8=Rebecca Yu|last8=Zhang|first9=Zhenyu|last9=Li|first10=Michelle Ka Yan|last10=Wu|first11=Kevin|last11=Sun|first12=Katharine|last12=Lee|first13=Staci|last13=Nguyen|first14=Jia Sophie|last14=Liu|first15=Paolo|last15=Carnevali|first16=Radoje|last16=Drmanac|first17=Brock A|last17=Peters|journal=Genetics in Medicine|volume=19|issue=9|pages=495–502|doi=10.1038/gim.2017.140|pmid=29758565|year=2018|doi-access=free}}

References

External links

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwTsRzbgBOU Girl Frozen In Time (TV Movie)] (TLC Documentary) at YouTube
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gF9SkmCEEU The Amazing Girl Who Doesn't Age!] on ABC's Good Morning America in August 2009