Brooke, who was born on January 8, 1993, has already served 20 years and is 73 cm, having not grown at all since I was 4 or 5 years. His story is a medical mystery that has baffled some of the best specialists worldwide.

Brooke's pediatrician, Dr. Lawrence Pakula from the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore, says the source of his sudden illness remains a mystery.



Because no doctor has been able to provide an official diagnosis Brooke's disease, his condition has been termed "Syndrome X". Brooke weighs about 7 kilos and is estimated to have the intellectual capacity of a 1 year old baby.

According to Dr. Eric Schadt, director of the Institute for Genomic Biology and multiscale Icahn at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York, Brooke has no apparent abnormality in the endocrine system, chromosomal abnormalities or serious, or any other known disease that may cause developmental problems.

The enigmatic character of Brooke's disease has led some researchers to believe that its unique genetic code could help understand the aging process. Dr. Schadt is sequencing the genome of Brooke with the hope that someday I can help discover new treatments for age-related disorders such as Parkinson's disease.