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Peyronie's disease can best be described as a localized connective tissue disorder that primarily affects the tunica albuginea of the penis. The disease may be attributed to repetitive vascular trauma that initiates an inflammatory process and ultimately leads to the formation of a fibrous penile plaque. The plaque consists mainly of collagen and can significantly alter penile anatomy and function. Patients with Peyronie's disease will most often present with penile curvature, pain on erection, a palpable nodule most commonly located on the dorsal shaft of the penis, and erectile dysfunction. There is no definitive treatment for Peyronie's disease and the treating physician has many options. They may wait for spontaneous resolution of the plaque, choose medical therapy (which includes both oral and intralesional regimens), or opt for surgical management. The main purpose of this article is to discuss the advances in medical therapy for Peyronie's disease, in particular intralesional injection of interferon-alpha-2b (IFN-alpha-2b). Several studies have concluded that IFN-alpha-2b can be an effective modality of treatment and that many patients placed on a regimen of IFN-alpha-2b experienced a significant reduction in penile curvature, diminished pain with erection, and decreased size of the plaque. Further clinical studies are currently being undertaken to determine the precise quantity and frequency of administration of IFN-alpha-2b that is most effective with the least amount of side effects.

Hock and Stuhlman1 discovered that the reaction of iron pentacarbonyl with mercuric halides yielded solid products, which they formulated as addition compounds Fe(CO)4Hg·(HgX2), containing the Fe(CO)4Hg moiety which itself can be obtained by reaction of iron pentacarbonyl and mercuric sulphate. No structural information on these compounds is available, although Wells2 has suggested that Fe(CO)4Hg is polymeric and trans.

IN a previous publication1 Adams and Gebbie reported the far-infra-red absorption spectra of some transition metal complex halides containing regular octahedral ions of the type MX6n−, X = halogen. We have now extended our observations to a series of halides of molybdenum and tungsten recently prepared by Edwards, Kennedy, Peacock and Said2.