Paediatric Research Society 333 Defective IgA response and atopy. B. Taylor,

A deficiency of immunoglobulin A at age 3 months has been found to be associated with atopy (positive prick skin tests and/or eczema) during the first year of life in infants bom to parents with atopic diseases. This deficiency of total serum IgA is transient, mean levels in the atopic infants reaching those found in the nonatopic infants at age 6 months. However, a qualitatively poor IgA response may persist. Such a defective IgA response (to the house dust mite Dermatophagoides farinae and to grass pollen during the pollen season) has been identified in the atopic parents of the children studied. Those individuals with positive prick skin tests had significantly less specific IgA antibody than did those who were skin test negative. Preliminary studies of a rate-limiting enzyma-tic step in absorption ofvitamin E esters. D. P. R. Mu]ler, J. A. Manning, and J. T. Harries. Institute o