Meet Brooke. She weights 16 pounds and is 30 inches in height. She has the normal mental capacity of an infant and enjoys doing any normal activities one would expect from someone of her age. The only difference between her and the other infants is that she is 16 years olds.
Scientists are baffled. No one seems to have an answer. "Why doesn't she age?" Howard Greenberg, 52, asked of his daughter. "Is she the fountain of youth?" Brooke has never been diagnosed with any known genetic syndrome or chromosomal abnormality. So why isn't she aging?
"Brooke's body is not developing as a coordinated unit, but as independent parts that are out of sync", claims Dr. Richard Walker of the University of South Florida College of Medicine, in Tampa. She still has baby teeth at 16, for instance. And her bone age is estimated to be more like 10 years old. There've been very minimal changes in Brooke's brain," Walker said. "Various parts of her body, rather than all being at the same stage, seem to be disconnected."
So is this the answer? Is Brooke's body simply developing in stages instead of as a whole to the point that she is not aging in the conventional sense that we know of? Whatever the answer is, scientists can agree upon the fact that her case is truly unique and remarkable to say the least.
"Many of the best-known names in medicine, in their experience ... had not seen anyone who matched up to Brooke," Pakula of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine pediatrician Lawrence Pakula, in Baltimore said. "She is always a surprise."
"Brooke is the nucleus of our family," said dad Howard Greenberg. "What if Brooke holds the secret to aging? We'd like to find out. We'd like to help people. Everybody's here for a reason. Maybe this is why Brooke is here."
"Brooke's body is not developing as a coordinated unit, but as independent parts that are out of sync", claims Dr. Richard Walker of the University of South Florida College of Medicine, in Tampa. She still has baby teeth at 16, for instance. And her bone age is estimated to be more like 10 years old. There've been very minimal changes in Brooke's brain," Walker said. "Various parts of her body, rather than all being at the same stage, seem to be disconnected."
So is this the answer? Is Brooke's body simply developing in stages instead of as a whole to the point that she is not aging in the conventional sense that we know of? Whatever the answer is, scientists can agree upon the fact that her case is truly unique and remarkable to say the least.
"Many of the best-known names in medicine, in their experience ... had not seen anyone who matched up to Brooke," Pakula of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine pediatrician Lawrence Pakula, in Baltimore said. "She is always a surprise."
"Brooke is the nucleus of our family," said dad Howard Greenberg. "What if Brooke holds the secret to aging? We'd like to find out. We'd like to help people. Everybody's here for a reason. Maybe this is why Brooke is here."
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