Me: This post will be my way to combine 4 scientific article all written by Dr. Brighton in trying to see if removed bovine growth plate cartilage chondrocytes can be still be made to proliferate. I wanted to see whether the chondrocytes can possibly be regrown back into cartilage through just cartilage proliferation and possibly adding the right amount and type of growth factor concoction. 

Analysis: In a very recent post I had written I had compared Brighton’s two articles which he in 1983 had shown that capacitative couled elctrical fields applied on epiphyseal plates lead to increased longitudinal growth but later in 1986 another article said that the experiment at 5 V peak to peak didn’t lead to any statistical increases. My conclusion for that post was that it was very strange and I couldn’t resolve why the two experiments reuslts seemed to contradict each other. 

Brighton and his collaborators took these chondrocytes from growth plates found in newborn calf costochondral junctions and put them in a monolayer. The monolayer was subjected to a capacitvely coupled electrical field for 2 days and the additon of compounds like thymidine, proline, and phosphate were also added to see what would be the result on these compounds in terms of uptake. The signals which were done for a long time had little effect but the signals that were done only for a short time had the highest effect. From the 2nd article,…

“It is concluded that short-term exposure of growth plate chondrocytes to an appropriate capacitively coupled field stimulates cAMP production, but longer-term application of the electrical field is ineffective.”

This seems to agree with the old articles. in the 2nd study done, those rabbits had their legs subjected to electrical fields constantly for 6 weeks. In the first study, those rabbits only had their plates subjected for 2-4 days.

From the 1st article…”We conclude that the biologic response of cells in vitro is signal specific, and that the total amount of electrical energy required to stimulate the growth plate chondrocyte to increased proliferation is very small since the total time the 0.25% duty cycle signal was only 3.6 min of a 24-h period.”

From the 3rd article, Brighton concludes that…“articular cartilage chondrocytes grown in pellet form can be stimulated to increase glycosaminoglycan synthesis or to increase cell proliferation by an appropriate capacitively coupled electrical field. The importance of the serum concentration in the medium in evaluation of biosynthesis in vitro is noted.” What is very important to note is that the higher voltage did nothing but the lower voltages had a dramatic affect on the thymidine and sulfate uptake 

From the 4th article, it shows that the researchers had taken bovine chondrocytes from growth plates and made pellets from them. They applied the same type of capacitively coupled electrical field and and showed almost the same results as in article 3. It was noted that anything past 30 minutes of application seemed to have a diminishing effect on proliferation. The cAMP levels increased significantly from the 200-1000 V peak to peak signals. 

Here are the big takeaways from it. If you use the electrical field for too long, it ruins the effects. If you use the field at too high of a voltage, it also ruins the effect. You want to keep any application and use of the signal generator at a short and low intensity level for maximum effect.

From source link HERE

J Orthop Res. 1989;7(5):759-65.

Proliferative and synthetic response of bovine growth plate chondrocytes to various capacitively coupled electrical fields.

This is a very quick study looking at the connection between growth plate fractures, and the bne bridges which can result from the bones healing after wards, which can often lead to limb lengthening issues like angular deformity. There are 5 types of growth plate fractures.

From Scientific Article entitled “Preclinical Studies on Mesenchymal Stem Cell-Based Therapy for Growth Plate Cartilage Injury Repair ” by  Rosa Chung,1, 2 Bruce K. Foster,3 and Cory J. Xian1, 2   located  HERE…

“The Salter-Harris classification system has been used to distinguish the different types of growth plate injuries and the relationship between the characteristics of the fractures and their prognoses (Figure 1) [1, 8–10]. Current literature indicates that the most common type of growth plate fractures occurring in the distal tibiae of younger children is type II (around 40%), which in most cases has a reasonably good prognosis as the cells responsible for interstitial growth of the growth plate as well as the epiphyseal blood supply remain undisturbed [10–12]. Other types of fractures, types III, IV, and V, however, may/will all result in bony formation at the injured site [13]. It has been estimated that in up to 30% of all children with growth plate-related injuries, undesirable bony repair, and bone bridge at the injury site hinder normal growth of the developing long bone in the affected limb [14, 15], which results in significant orthopaedic problems such as limb length discrepancy and bone angulation deformity [15, 16]. “

From About.Com link HERE

Types of Growth Plate Fractures

By Jonathan Cluett, M.D., About.com Guide

Updated October 04, 2010

Me: One of the more recent posts I wrote about HERE was about this patent which was a very unique and novel way to possibly increase longitudinal growth by placing electrical signals next to the epiphyseal plate areas in the legs. I got in contact with the inventor of the patent Dr. Brighton and he directed me to the original PubMed scientific article that was the basis for the patent. In doing so I did some research and also found a very similar type of study which Brighton had also done which showed that just giving electrical signals to the plates didn’t work all the time. Here is my analysis on the two papers and what you should take away from them at this time.

Analysis: The bottom article was published in 1986 while the top article was published in 1983, both for the same scientific journal. It is very clear that the 2nd article was a description of the followup of the experiment performed on the first. In the first one, they found out the 5 volts peak to peak sine wave function at 60 kiloHertz frequency resulted in statistical increase in bone lenthening. The second article says that there was NONE. The major differences between the two experiments is that they used a different way to mark the line of initial growth plate physis and how to track any possible longitudinal lengthening of the growth plate from osssification. In the first they used florescent microscopy and the second used something known as Tantalum marker and roentgenograms (I don’t know what they are). The other major difference is that a battery pack which I would assume is is the electrical energy source . The rabbits in the 2nd experiment has to wear body vests, leg wrappings, and a 9 volt battery (like you find in any grocery store which is not really that heavy) attached to their back. In the end of the 2nd experiment, not only did the rabbits of both the experiemtnal and control not increase in lengthe of limbs, they actually lost body weight compared to normal rabbits. The conclusion that was reached was that it is possible that the body vest and leg wrappings somehow created a hindrance and kept the rabbits from increasing in the limbs like in the first experiment. What is very odd for me is that normal small sized batteris like the 9 volts only give a DC power source, not an AC power source. They wrote in the abstract that a sin wave was given. Sin waves are sinusoidal , so tehy are AC in nature. It is very strange that you can strap only a 9 volt battery to a rabbit’s back and be able to produce a AC sine wave wiithout having also a wave modulator/ generator also attached. That would be a better explanation because that would increase the amount of weight on the rabbit’s back by far more. 

From PubMed article link HERE

J Orthop Res. 1983;1(1):42-9.

In vivo growth plate stimulation in various capacitively coupled electrical fields.

From PubMed article link HERE

J Orthop Res. 1986;4(4):446-51.

Failure of the rabbit tibial growth plate to respond to the long-term application of a capacitively-coupled electrical field.

Me: I wanted to put up a long list of random articles I have found all across the internet which all seem to point at the fact that people of above average stature just seem to be either better or have a better quality of life than people who are of below average stature. This is not to say that people taller than you will always be happier and be better than you. We at this website are trying to change that. My motto has always been that with enough innovation and intelligence once day we will find a way to increase even our adult height so that we might even be taller than what nature had destined us to limit us to be. All I did was just type in the two words “tall people” on Google. All of the articles posted below are from just the first page that appeared. 

From the website for Time Business magazine HERE…

From the website for Psychology Today HERE…

Why are taller people more intelligent than shorter people?

Why are taller people more intelligent than shorter people?

Published on January 25, 2009 by Satoshi Kanazawa in The Scientific Fundamentalist

In my previous post, I explain that men on average are slightly but significantly more intelligent than women, not because they are men, but because they are taller.  But why are taller people more intelligent than shorter people?The real answer is we don’t know for sure, but there are two possible explanations.  First, both height and intelligence may be indicators of underlying health.  According to this view, people who are genetically and developmentally healthier simultaneously grow taller and become more intelligent than those who are less healthy, producing the positive correlation between height and intelligence.

This is a plausible theory.  In our paper, however, Reyniers and I produce evidence against it.  In the analysis of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, we control for the respondent’s health, by using four indicators of health and producing a latent variable for health using principal component analysis in order to eliminate random measurement error.  The association between height and intelligence does not diminish at all when we control for health.   In fact, once we control for other demographic and social variables, health is not significantly correlated with intelligence at all; it actually has a nonsignificantly negativeassociation with intelligence.  So, at least in our sample, health is unlikely to be the common cause for both height and intelligence.

In our paper, Reyniers and I propose a second possible explanation.  It consists of three separate mechanisms.

1.  Assortative mating of tall men and beautiful women.  Because height is desirable in men and physical attractiveness is desirable in women, there should be assortative mating between tall men and beautiful women (and short men and less beautiful women).  Because both height and physical attractiveness are heritable, this will create an extrinsic (non-causal) correlation among their children between height and physical attractiveness, where tall people (both men and women) are more beautiful than short people.

2.  Assortative mating of intelligent men and beautiful women.  Because intelligent men tend to attain higher status, at least in the evolutionarily novel environment in recent history, and high status is desirable in men, and because physical attractiveness is desirable in women, there should be assortative mating between intelligent (and thus high-status) men and beautiful women.  Because both intelligence and physical attractiveness are heritable, this will create an extrinsic (non-causal) correlation among their children between intelligence and physical attractiveness, where more attractive people are more intelligent than less attractive people.

3.  Extrinsic correlation between height and physical attractiveness (produced by Mechanism 1 above) and extrinsic correlation between intelligence and physical attractiveness (produced by Mechanism 2 above) will create a second-order extrinsic correlation between height and intelligence.

We believe that this may be why taller people are more intelligent than shorter people.  Another factor contributing to the seeming male advantage in intelligence is that taller parents are more likely to have sons than shorter parents.  So, over many generations, more sons will inherit their parents’ genes inclining them to be taller and more intelligent, and more daughters will inherit their parents’ genes inclining them to be shorter and less intelligent.  But, once again, the crucial factor is height, not sex.

In our paper, we present evidence for all of the crucial mechanisms:  Taller people are on average physically more attractive than shorter people; physically more attractive people are on average more intelligent than physically less attractive people; taller people are on average more intelligent than shorter people; and taller parents are more likely to have sons than shorter parents.  But the issue is far from resolved.  While there is no doubt that taller people are indeed more intelligent than shorter people, the question of why this is so is one of the remaining puzzles in evolutionary psychology.

From the website for news for the Men’s Health Magazine HERE…

BODY SCIENCE

Why Tall Men Win

by Chris Garcia October 25, 2011, 09:00 am EDT

It’s OK, man—Tom Cruise is short, too, and he’s a millionaire.

Napoleon was right to have a complex: We like our leaders tall. People prefer bosses and political leaders to be physically imposing, which is one reason why tall people push for leadership positions more often than their shorter counterparts, according to a pair of studies in Social Science Quarterly.

The two studies interviewed 467 college students about leadership abilities and asked them to draw an ideal leader next to an average citizen. Sixty-four percent of the students drew the leader as taller than the citizen. The second study quizzed students about their effectiveness as leaders and asked if they would ever seek out a leadership position. As height of the male respondent increased, so did his confidence in his leadership abilities.

“People tend to ally themselves in groups with certain taller individuals,” said study co-author Prof. Gregg R. Murray, professor of political science at Texas Tech University. “The taller individual then tends to dominate the group, which builds the taller person’s confidence further down the road.”

So what does that mean for the rest of us? The key is to mimic the confidence of tall people. Here’s how:

Keep the tone of your voice steady. Murray advises watching a Larry King interview with a famous celebrity or politician. King often manipulated the tone of his voice to match that of his powerful subjects. The key is to keep your tone constant. Lowering it conveys embarrassment and meekness.

Stay on top of your workout. Evolutionary theory suggests that tall people earn our trust because their physical dominance makes us feel protected, Murray says. If you don’t have the natural height advantage, you can still convey the illusion of height by making a simple adjustment to your posture. Follow these tips on how to carry your body.

Don’t underdress. Appearance is everything. One way to gain the benefit of physical dominance is to look like you matter, says Murray. Easier said than done? Get the Men’s Health Color Advantage and gravitate toward the shoes, pants and shirts that will help you naturally exude confidence.

Trust your abilities. “What our study really shows,” Murray says, “is that people who feel qualified are more likely to put themselves out there and take a risk.” It sounds like a no-brainer, but knowing you’re qualified and performing like it are two very different things. Just follow the lead of the World’s Richest and Fittest Guys. They’ll teach you that taking a big risk can lead to huge dividends—regardless of height.

From Malcolm Gladwell’s own blog HERE….

Why do we love tall men?

This excerpt is from the part of “Blink” where I talk about the things that throw off our powers of rapid cognition. I’ve just been talking about a test–called the IAT–which measures your level of “unconscious prejudice.” That’s the kind of prejudice that you have that you aren’t aware of, that affects the kinds of impressions and conclusions that you reach automatically, without thinking.

Or what if the person you are interviewing is tall? On a conscious level, I’m sure that all of us don’t think that we treat tall people any differently from short people. But there’s plenty of evidence to suggest that height–particularly in men–does trigger a certain set of very positive, unconscious associations. I polled about half of the companies on the Fortune 500 list–the largest corporations in the United States–asking each company questions about its CEO. The heads of big companies are, as I’m sure comes as no surprise to anyone, overwhelmingly white men, which undoubtedly reflects some kind of implicit bias. But they are also virtually all tall: In my sample, I found that on average CEOs were just a shade under six feet. Given that the average American male is 5’9″ that means that CEOs, as a group, have about three inches on the rest of their sex. But this statistic actually understates matters. In the U.S. population, about 14.5 percent of all men are six feet or over. Among CEOs of Fortune 500 companies, that number is 58 percent. Even more strikingly, in the general American population, 3.9 percent of adult men are 6’2″ or taller. Among my CEO sample, 30 percent were 6’2″ or taller. The lack of women or minorities among the top executive ranks at least has a plausible explanation. For years, for a number of reasons having to do with discrimination and cultural patterns, there simply weren’t a lot of women and minorities entering the management ranks of American corporations. So today, when boards of directors look for people with the necessary experience to be candidates for top positions, they can argue somewhat plausibly that there aren’t a lot of women and minorities in the executive pipeline. But this is simply not true of short people. It is possible to staff a company entirely with white males, but it is not possible to staff a company without short people: there simply aren’t enough tall people to go around. Yet none of those short people ever seem to make it into the executive suite. Of the tens of millions of American men below 5’6″, a grand total of ten–in my sample–have reached the level of CEO, which says that being short is probably as much, or more, of a handicap to corporate success as being a woman or an African-American. (The grand exception to all of these trends is American Express CEO Kenneth Chenault, who is both on the short side (5’9″) and black. He must be a remarkable man to have overcome two Warren Harding Errors.)

Is this a deliberate prejudice? Of course not. No one ever says, dismissively, of a potential CEO candidate that ‘he’s too short.’ This is quite clearly the kind of unconscious prejudice that the IAT picks up. Most of us, in ways that we are not entirely aware of, automatically associate leadership ability with imposing physical stature. We have a sense, in our minds, of what a leader is supposed to look like, and that stereotype is so powerful that when someone fits it, we simply become blind to other considerations. And this isn’t confined to the corporate suite. Not long ago, researchers went back and analyzed the data from four large research studies, that had followed thousands of people from birth to adulthood, and calculated that when corrected for variables like age and gender and weight, an inch of height is worth $789 a year in salary. That means that a person who is six feet tall, but who is otherwise identical to someone who is five foot five, will make on average $5,525 more per year. As Timothy Judge, one of the authors of the study, points out: “If you take this over the course of a 30-year career and compound it, we’re talking about a tall person enjoying literally hundreds of thousands of dollars of earnings advantage.” Have you ever wondered why so many mediocrities find their way into positions of authority in companies and organizations? It’s because when it comes to even the most important positions, we think that our selection decisions are a good deal more rational than they actually are. We see a tall person, and we swoon.

From CBS NEWS HERE…

By      LLOYD DE VRIES /

CBS/ February 11, 2009, 8:06 PM

The Trouble With Tall People

Tall people have a special status in our culture. Often without good reason, they are thought of as leaders — as “standing tall above the rest.” In school, the tallest boys are the first to get dates. Tall girls are told they look great — “like beautiful models.” Short people with big egos are often said to have a “Napoleon Complex,” but nobody ever talks about tall, egotistical people as having a “de Gaulle Complex.” The average height in this country is 5 feet 9 inches for men, and about 5 feet 4 for women. Anybody below that comes up short.

I’m not proud to admit that I haven’t lost a lot of sleep over the fact that a former jockey will probably never be President of the United States. In my entire career, I don’t think I’ve ever been financially discriminated against because of my height. Then again, a comedy writer who is 5-feet-7 is considered on the tall side.

However, my attitude towards heightism changed recently when I read a University of North Carolina study. My consciousness, if not my height, has been raised. It turns out that short people are discriminated against in a way I never knew about — financially.

Statistically speaking, the taller you are, the more money you make. Each inch is worth about $789 more per year. Someone who is six feet tall is expected to earn $5523 more per year than someone who is 5-feet-five. Taken over a 30-year career, the smaller person’s height makes him come up hundreds of thousands of dollars short. Tall people get better job evaluations and quicker raises. So, short people don’t just have to put up with the good stuff always being on the top shelf or tall people sitting in front of them at the movies. A tall person’s earning power is head-and-shoulders above his shorter counterpart. And that is wrong.

Our reverence for height comes from primitive times. Back when we lived in caves, size was a more important survival trait than now. It made evolutionary sense. When a guy was coming at you with a spear, he was probably not going to be impressed by your command of the new tax laws or your ability to tell a really funny joke.

About 50 years ago, something strange happened — Americans stopped growing taller. In World War I, the average American soldier was two inches taller than the average German. Since around 1955, Germans and most people around the world have been growing taller, but we’ve stayed the same.

Is this another evolutionary development? Is America genetically ahead of the rest of the world in realizing that judging people by height is silly in this day and age? Will favoring tall people soon be a thing of the past? Is the height gene being phased out like the appendix or the ability to fricassee a lemur? Is American society finally evolving so that it will soon value things like intelligence, kindness, and sensitivity more than an ability to look good in designer clothes?

Don’t bet on it. Experts believe our failure to continue to grow taller has more to do with diet and exercise than with developing more humanistic attitudes. We’re growing wider, not taller. Meanwhile other countries are catching up to our height because they have been eating well. Maybe this development will have a positive effect. Maybe height will become less and less important to us as we stop towering over the rest of the world.

But I doubt it. I don’t think American pride will allow it. Height worship is too ingrained in our culture. Right now, the average height of men in the Netherlands is six-feet-one-inch. The Dutch are four inches taller than we are. The Dutch! Are our leaders really going to sit still and do nothing as the people of the world keep sprouting up and looking down on us? Can’t you just hear future politicians talking about closing the “height gap?”

There is bound to be some mistrust and suspicion if Americans continue to come up short internationally. Our proud leaders might even accuse other countries of employing the Ultimate Weapon in the Longitudinal War — using extra-high heels or putting lifts in their shoes. That’s right. Unless we get over our height hang-up, a vertically challenged president of the future might very well call for inspection teams to look for “Shoes of Mass Elevation.”

Lloyd Garver has written for many television shows, ranging from “Sesame Street” to “Family Ties” to “Frasier.” He has also read many books, some of them in hardcover.

By Lloyd Garver      Copyright 2009 CBS. All rights reserved.

From BBC News HERE…

Page last updated at 10:35 GMT, Thursday, 10 September 2009 11:35 UK

Tall people lead ‘better lives’

Taller people live better lives, according to US researchers. More than 454,000 adults aged 18 and over were asked by phone for their height and evaluate their lives. Overall, taller individuals judged their lives more favourably and were more likely to report positive emotions such as enjoyment and happiness. Reporting to the journal Economics and Human Biology, they conclude that this is because the taller people also had higher incomes and education. Ladder The researchers used the Cantril “self-measuring striving scale” which asks you to imagine a ladder with rungs numbered from zero at the bottom to 10 at the top. The 10th rung represents the “best possible life for you” and the bottom is the “worst possible life for you”. Participants were asked to report on which rung of the ladder they thought they stood on at the present time.    Surprisingly people who say that their lives are the ‘best possible’ are slightly shorter on average  Angus Deaton Princeton University Men who were above average height 5ft 10in (177.8cm) reported that they were standing higher on the ladder than men who were below average height. They had an average ladder score of 6.55 compared to the shorter men who scored 6.41. Women scored higher overall than men on the ladder scale and there was less difference between the taller and shorter women. Taller women above the average height of 5ft 4in ( 162.6cm) scored 6.64 compared to a score of 6.55 for the shorter women. But one of the lead researchers, Angus Deaton from Princeton University, said: “Surprisingly people who say that their lives are the ‘best possible’ are slightly shorter on average than those who are a step or two below. “Perhaps the 8% of people who think their lives cannot be improved are different in other respects.” Positive emotions The study also looked at people’s emotions. Taller men and women were more likely to report enjoyment and happiness, and less likely to report pain and sadness.  The people who are happiest are not the very tallest- there is a threshold of height tolerance  Dr Colin Gill Chartered psychologist Taller men, although not taller women, also worry less. But sadness and anger were more likely to be experienced. The authors say their findings cannot be attributed to different demographics or ethnicity, but are almost entirely explained by the positive association between height and both income and education, both of which are positively linked to better lives. ‘Height matters’ Chartered psychologist Dr Colin Gill said: “There’s no direct correlation between income and happiness – surveys going back years show that. “But there does appear to be a correlation between height and happiness and height and income. “If you look at this study, the people who are happiest are not the very tallest. “There is a threshold of height tolerance – at about 6ft 5in (195.6cm) to 6ft 6in (198.1cm). “It is about as tall as people think is normal, beyond that you are odd and life becomes very difficult. “Height does matter, it’s always mattered for a very obvious reason – when you are born you are shorter than the people who look after you and have authority over you. “And that power relationship never reverses.”

Me: So I currently have found 3 main contenders for the tallest couples in the modern era who are still alive. I have previously done  a post talking about the tallest couple in history with Anna Haining Bates and Martin Van Buren Bates but not about the tallest living couples today.

So they are…

Contenders #1: Wayne and Laurie Hallquist at 6′ 10.4″ and 6′ 6″ respectively = combined total height of 13 ‘ 4″ or 407. 4 cm. (this would make the couple tallest in the USA)

Contenders #2: Wilco Van Kleef-Bolton is 7ft and his partner Keisha is 6ft 5in = combine total height of 13′ 5″ (this would make the couple tallest in the UK)

Contenders #3: Yao Ming and his wife who have been consistently reported at 7′ 6″ and 6′ 2.5″ = combined total height of 13′ 8.5″ (this would make the couple tallest in China)

Note: What I don’t understand is why Yao has not decided to contact Guinness World Records and not take the title of tallest couple from the other two contenders. His height can easy overwhelm the male height of the other two couples. 

From source link 1 HERE

California couple stand out as world’s tallest

(Reuters) – Their height made Wayne and Laurie Hallquist seem like an ideal match when they met seven years ago, and on Thursday they were matched with something else — the title of world’s tallest living married couple.

Guinness World Records bestowed that towering distinction to the Hallquists in a ceremony under the marquee at its Hollywood museum. The couple arrived in a white limousine, with Wayne sporting a tuxedo and Laurie in a white wedding dress.

The Hallquists, who live in Stockton, California, measure a combined 13 feet, 4 inches, or 407.4 centimeters, to be exact. He stands 6 feet 10.4 inches, she 6 feet 5.95 inches, the Guinness organization said.

“It’s a whole different perspective up here, and we can find each other quite easily in a crowd,” Laurie told Reuters.

“We can see several people going bald that might not know it at the moment,” joked Wayne, 57, who works as a telephone company wire splicer.

The Hallquists said that when they met at a church singles club in 2003, they could tell that others around them were sizing up a possible love affair because of their height.

“She walked in, everyone looked at her, then they looked at me,” Wayne said.

But while Wayne said it was love at first sight for him, Laurie their first meeting came up short.

“He talked about the size of my hands and feet, which is kind of a no-no,” said Laurie, 46. “And then the second time we had a chance to talk, I figured out he was a really good guy.”

They have been married for seven years, but it took the Hallquists until this year to contact Guinness World Records.

The couple said they were discouraged at first from making a play for world’s tallest couple, because they read online that a man and a woman each standing over 7 feet had married in the 19th century.

Only this year did they realize they could compete in another category: world’s tallest living married couple.

Guinness previously listed a couple in England — Wilco and Keisha van Kleef-Bolton — as the world’s tallest couple at a combined height of 13 feet, 3 inches.

The Hallquists knew they could beat that — by an inch. So they contacted Guinness, and the organization had them measured by a doctor and a notary to make it official.

Laurie, a former college basketball player who now works as a realtor, said she dated shorter men before Wayne, including one “kind of macho” guy who stood 5-foot-7. She described that pairing as “a little awkward” and said that she likes looking up to her husband — at least physically.

If recent history is any indication, the Hallquists may have a limited time to stand out. The van Kleef-Boltons were only named world’s tallest couple last year, before the Hallquists stepped up to challenge them.

“There may be people who are taller than the Hallquists, but unless we go out and can measure them, the Hallquists have the record all to themselves,” said Guinness World Records adjudicator Stuart Claxton.

(Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis, Editing by Steve Gorman and Peter Bohan)

From source link 2 HERE

Their family’s still growing! World’s tallest married couple welcome huge 9.2lb son to follow in his father’s size 15 footsteps

• Wilco Van Kleef-Bolton is 7ft and his partner Keisha is 6ft 5in
• Newborn Jonah measured impressive 56cm – only 2 per cent of neonatals are longer
  
• Their other son, Lucas, 6, is already 4ft 5.5in, the height of an 11-year-old
• Their daughter Eva, 4, is 3ft 7in – the typical height of a five-year-old

By NICK ENOCH

PUBLISHED: 10:22 GMT, 11 July 2012 | UPDATED: 14:04 GMT, 11 July 2012

When your parents are the world’s tallest married couple, there’s a strong chance you too are going to stand out from the crowd. And Keisha and Wilco Van Kleef-Bolton’s latest arrival is no exception.Weighing in at 9.2lb, baby Jonah already seems to be following in his father’s giant size 15 footsteps. Jonah measured an impressive 56cm when he was born, hitting the 98th percentile of baby lengths – meaning only 2 per cent of newborns are this length or longer.

Jonah, who was born in June, is set to add to the Van Kleef-Boltons’ combined height of 21ft – which is almost four feet taller than an average couple with children the same age.

Keisha and Wilco, from Dagenham, Essex, currently hold a Guinness World Record for being the world’s tallest couple.

Keisha, 32, said: ‘I love being a mum and I love watching my children grow up tall like their parents.

‘We would love to be the world’s tallest family – but we’ve a way to go yet.

‘If Jonah is anything like Wilco and Lucas, he will break every height marker for his age.

‘We’re already investing in clothes for three-year-olds and only buying a few outfits for very new babies because our kids grow so fast.

‘Because I’m used to having tall kids, Jonah seems extra tiny at the moment. But at 9lb 2oz, he was a big baby and he’s already gone up to more than 10lb.

‘I’m a very protective mother and being so tall means I can keep an eye on where my kids are at all times.’

Keisha, who wore men’s clothes when she was pregnant because there weren’t any maternity outfits big enough, said the couple would like another child.

She said: ‘Four is a nice number, but we have enough on our hands for the time being.

‘We’ll have to wait until Lucas and Eva are bigger – which by the looks of things isn’t going to be long.’

Keisha met school security guard Wilco, 31, after putting an ad out through the Tall Persons Club UK looking for a dance partner.

When the couple married in 2001, they raised the doorframes in their home to stop them clipping their heads.

The couple still have a bedroom that is only big enough for a standard double bed, forcing them to sleep with their feet hanging out.

Wilco, who has 40-inch legs, stood at 5ft 10in by the time he was just ten.

His wife said she suffered from jokes at school about her height and had to stop wearing high heels when she was 18 and her shoe size went past an eight.

Wilco said: ‘Jonah is a fantastic addition to our family and Lucas and Eva are crazy about him.

‘The biggest problem at the moment is teaching our kids to ride their bikes because being so tall we have to bend over constantly, which is quite painful for our backs.

‘Lucas has already grown out of his school uniform this year so we’ll have to get him trousers for 10-year-olds next.

‘They both go through about three pairs of shoes per year.’

Dutch-born Wilco buys his clothes from specialist websites that normally supply size 15 shoes to American basketball players.

And Keisha struggles to find outlets which supply clothes which cater for her 38in legs – despite being a size 12.

She said: ‘I use normal women’s dresses as shirts because they come up so short. I can never find things I like in my size.

‘Flying on budget airlines with no legroom is a problem too.

‘But there are perks – I never have to use a stepladder to reach the top shelf.’

Me: This is the fourth in a series I will do on India. This one is a little harder to validate because the person being profiled has a height that is very hard to verify.

On the one hand the article below says that she is claimed to be 8 feet tall. Her mother states in the article that Siddiqa was 7′ 6″ four months ago and that she has since grown more height since then.

From the Tallest Man website, Siddiqa is listed at just 7′ 0″ which seems more reasonable. The Guinness World Records have been contacted to verify Siddiqa’s height to gain her popularity so she can help her family financially. 

What I would note that the girl is Bengali, which is technically in  South Asia but not a part of India. The article says that she is from the South Dinajpur District. 

It is worth noting that althought Svetlana Singh has claimed to be 7′ 2″ she was measured at some point to be only 6′ 8″ which would make her one of the tallest but not the tallest female in India. 

Also if we decide to include the country of Nepal as a part of South Asia then the title of tallest female would actually go to Urmila Kumari Chaudhari who is from Nepal standing at either 7′ 1″ or 7′ 3″. Her profile at the Tallest Man website can be found HERE.

From The Tallest Man…

Siddiqa Parvin – over 7 feet 0 inches. (over 213.4 cm)

From NDTV

Seven-foot tall woman draws crowds in Bengal

Indo-Asian News Service | Updated: July 03, 2012 20:23 IST

From the website for the Online newspaper The Sunday Indian located HERE

Is Siddiqa the tallest woman in the world?