When seeing each other for the first time in almost 70 years, George Skrzynecky and Lucian Poznanski couldn't stop the tears from flowing.

The twin brothers, who are now both 69 years old, were born in Germany in 1946 after their Polish mother, Elizabeth, was freed from a forced labor camp at the end of World War II, according to the BBC. She was too ill to care for them so they were sent to Poland, where they were adopted separately.

Since the 1980s, the global twinning rate has increased by a third, from 9.1 to 12.0 twin deliveries per 1000 deliveries, to about 1.6 million twin pairs each year.

It was already known that in the 1980s natural twinning rates were low in (East) Asia and South America, at an intermediate level in Europe and North America, and high in many African countries. It was also known that in recent decades, twinning rates have been increasing in the wealthier parts of our world as a result of the rise in medically assisted reproduction (MAR) and delayed childbearing.

So far, thousands of identical and fraternal twins, same and gender different have joined the Hungarian Twin Registry established at Semmelweis University, which aims to contact all twins in Hungary. With the establishment of the population-based Hungarian twin registry, it will be possible to explore new observations and connections in many fields of science, which can contribute to the preservation of health, the prevention of diseases and the development of more effective treatments.

The Joint 5th World Congress on Twin Pregnancy:
A Global Perspective & The 17th Congress of the International Society Twin Studies (ISTS)

4-6 June 2021 · Hybrid Congress · Beijing, China

The Congress Scientific Committee invites you to submit your original research for poster and oral presentation. This is your chance to contribute to the growth and development of twins research by sharing important findings to the scientific community!

One day in 1954, Jack Yufe, a store owner from Southern California, stepped off a train in Essen, West Germany, and began searching the crowd at the station. He was looking for someone he had not seen since he was a baby, 21 years earlier.

A man approached. A strangely familiar man. “What a nerve, someone is wearing my face,” Mr. Yufe (pronounced YOO-fee) recalled thinking in an interview with Nancy L. Segal for her 2005 book, “Indivisible by Two: Lives of Extraordinary Twins.”

Despite the important role that monozygotic twins have played in genetics research, little is known about their genomic differences. Here we show that monozygotic twins differ on average by 5.2 early developmental mutations and that approximately 15% of monozygotic twins have a substantial number of these early developmental mutations specific to one of them. Using the parents and offspring of twins, we identified pre-twinning mutations.

The siblings - a girl and a boy - were born in the Indian state of Chhattisgarh during an ongoing nationwide lockdown.
"The delivery happened after facing several difficulties and therefore, my husband and I wanted to make the day memorable," the twins' 27-year-old mother told news agency Press Trust of India.
She said the coronavirus was "dangerous and life-threatening", but the COVID-19 outbreak had also made people focus on sanitation, hygiene and instil other good habits.

TWINS2020 congress will be held in Beijing, China between 3-5 July, 2020.
Regitstration: https://www.mcascientificevents.eu/twins/
MAIN TOPICS:
Emerging methods in twin research
Delivery of twins: cesarean delivery, pph
Care in pregnancy and labour
Large collaborative studies in twin birth cohorts
OMICS twin studies
Psychological studies of twins
Twin-related complications
Preterm birth and prematurity

Confirmed Speakers:
Jaakko Kaprio
Monica Rankin
Nancy Seagal
Lise Dubois
Gonneke Willemsen
Jeff Craig
Dale Nyholt
John Hopper
Juko Ando
Lucas Ferreira
Chika Honda

Program Outline:
Monday 20th June
08:00-10:00   Registration desk is open
09:00-09:15   Acknowledgement of Country and Opening of the meeting
09:15-17:00   ICTS Scientific Sessions @ QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute