features very prominent physicians and scientists as contributors who bring their most recent discoveries to the benefit of readers. Their expertise will help clinicians with proper diagnosis of sometimes elusive and uncommon heritable diseases of soft connective tissues. This book also offers an update on the pathophysiology of these diseases, including an emphasis on unifying aspects such as connections between embryonic development of the different types of connective tissues and systems, and the role of TGF-beta in development and physiology of soft tissues. This new set of data explains, at least in part, why many of these disorders are interconnected, though the primary pathophysiological events, such as gene mutations, may be different for each disorder.