Saturday, August 24

Mirror Twins And The Identical Exam Results Coincidence

Mirror twins

It's recently been the time when UK students - aged between 14 and 16 - get their GCSE (General Certificate of Secondary Education) results. They are graded A to G or U if ungraded. There is also an A* grade (called A-star) for an exceptional standard.

Mirror twin brothers, Charles and Cammie Stewart-Syme from the Manchester Grammar School, have just got their results. In what has been described as an astonishing coincidence they achieved identical results of seven A* grades and three A grades.

They will now go on to study identical A Levels (a higher level than GCSE's) in Biology, Chemistry, Maths and History.

Their mother says that because the pair are mirror twins they have had an incredible number of coincidences throughout their lives.

The twins hope that following completion of their A Levels they can go on and study at an American university.

So what are Mirror Twins? This is Wikipedia's definition:

"Mirror Image Twins result when a fertilized egg splits later in the embryonic stage than normal timing, around day 9-12. This type of twinning could exhibit characteristics with reversed asymmetry, such as opposite dominant handedness, dental structure, even personality traits connected to right-brain or left-brain dominant individuals. If the split occurs later than this time period, the twins risk being conjoined."

I have also read that 'Mirror Twins are genetically identical and this means they have the exact same DNA.'

Identical DNA can prove a problem if a crime has been committed, such as with the recent case in the UK of the twins Mohammed and Aftab Asghar. They have the same DNA and have both appeared in court charged over the rape of a woman.

In February there was a similar problem when 24-year-old twin brothers were held in Marseille, France, by police hunting a rapist. Their genetic codes were so similar that normal DNA tests could not tell them apart.

But I've strayed from Charles and Cammie's achievements. Well done to them and others who have had good GSCE results.

Other Twin Story Posts:
The Coincidences Of Twins Growing Up Separately
The Twinless Twin Mystery
After 28 Years She Met Her Unknown Twin In Sweden

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1 comment:

  1. Identical twins continue to fascinate...but I'd never heard of mirror twins before.

    ReplyDelete