A Thing or Two About Twins

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A Thing or Two About Twins

They have the same piercing eyes. The same color hair. One may be shy, while the other loves meeting new people. Discovering why identical twins differ—despite having the same DNA—could reveal a great deal about all of us.

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"We're wired the same," says Don Wolf (at right) of his twin, Dave, explaining how they've gotten along as truck-driving partners for 18 years. "He's messier than I am," Don says. "But we like the same music and share the same sense of humor."

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Even when they're not acting in movies like Creeporia, a comedy-horror film, Camille Kitt (at left) and her sister, Kennerly, prefer to dress alike. The twins are also professional harpists and former tae kwon do instructors.

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Ranked number one in the world, the doubles team of Mike (at left) and Bob Bryan has won more than 70 championships, including Wimbledon in 2011. The 33-year-olds anticipate each other so well opponents accuse them of being telepathic.

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Born in China, Gillian Shaw (at left) and Lily MacLeod were adopted as infants by two Canadian couples—a rare case of twins being knowingly raised apart. The families get together often, allowing the girls to hang out and make up for lost time.

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After Doug Malm (at far right) and his twin, Phil, met Jill Lassen (third from right) and her twin, Jena, Doug told Phil to "pick one and don't be changing." Today the couples live in the same house in Moscow, Idaho, with Phil and Jena's son, Tim, and Doug and Jill's daughter, Rylie.

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Juan Barbachano (at right) and his identical twin, Liana Hoemke, hold a photo of them as little girls with their baby brother, Leon. Juan, born Juanita, says that from an early age he felt like a male trapped in a female's body. At 14 he attempted suicide. Ten years ago, at 32, Juan began treatments to change gender. "I'm more comfortable in my body than ever before," he says.

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With the same casual gait, Ned and Fred Mitchell stroll along the waterfront in Charleston, South Carolina, where they repaired nuclear submarines before retiring in 1996. For twins as close as the Mitchells, living in sync seems to come naturally.

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Ned Mitchell (at left) and his brother, Fred, enjoy a glass of wine on Fred's front porch after attending church one Sunday. Ned lives in an identical house next door in Hollywood, South Carolina, where the twins served together on the town council for 12 years.

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In a search for the cause of twinning, geneticist Bruno Reversade of Singapore’s Institute of Medical Biology collects saliva from nine-month-old Ayush Yadav, held by his mother, Babita, in the northern Indian village of Mohammad Pur Umri. Women from the village have given birth to identical twins at a rate ten times higher than normal. Reversade speculates that a specific gene modification may be responsible.