[Biochemical investigations and trisomy 21 (author's transl)].

A general consideration of the pathogenesis of the various metabolic diseases which produce mental deficiency suggests that perturbation of the one carbon (folate) cycle may be important. Secondly, a review of diseases having some symptoms in common with trisomy 21 suggests the evidence of : a collagen disturbance (hypothyroidism and iminodipeptidurial) ; an oxygen disturbance (hypothyroidism and hemoglobinopathies) ; a cholinergic distrubance (Alzheimer's disease) ; a one-carbon-cycle disturbance (Lesch-Nyhan's disease). Thirdly, the peculiar pathology of trisomy 21 allows to find also a cholinergic disturbance and a disturbance close to the 10 formyl-tetrahydrololate entry of the folate cycle. Finally, an analysis of the possible effect of the excess of superoxide dismutase A and of the increase of glutathion peroxidase leads to the suspicion that a difficulty exists of dioxygenations and of non aromatic hydroxilations with a relative retardation of some FAD requiring reactions. A simplified scheme shows that these metabolic deviations could provoke a disturbance of the collagen and of synthesis of chemical mediators, in accordance with the indications furnished by the compared pathogenesis of the various affections studied. These heuristic reflexions open the way to further investigations.