In itself, NSML is not a life-threatening diagnosis, most people diagnosed with the condition live normal lives. Obstructive cardiomyopathy and other pathologic findings involving the cardiovascular system may be a cause of death in those whose cardiac deformities are profound.

Spanish researchers reported the development of a Costello mouse, with the G12V mutation, in early 2008. Although the G12V mutation is rare among children with Costello syndrome, and the G12V mouse does not appear to develop tumors as expected, information about the mouse model's heart may be transferrable to humans.

Italian and Japanese researchers published their development of a Costello zebrafish in late 2008, also with the G12V mutation. The advent of animal models may accelerate identification of treatment options.

A 2007 study followed 112 individuals for a mean of 12 years (mean age 25.3, range 12–71). No patient died during follow-up, but several required medical interventions. The mean final heights were 167 and 153 cm for men and women, respectively, which is approximately 2 standard deviations below normal.

Costello syndrome, also called faciocutaneoskeletal syndrome or FCS syndrome, is a rare genetic disorder that affects many parts of the body. It is characterized by delayed development and delayed mental progression, distinctive facial features, unusually flexible joints, and loose folds of extra skin, especially on the hands and feet. Heart abnormalities are common, including a very fast heartbeat (tachycardia), structural heart defects, and overgrowth of the heart muscle (hypertrophic cardiomyopathy). Infants with Costello syndrome may be large at birth, but grow more slowly than other children and have difficulty feeding. Later in life, people with this condition have relatively short stature and many have reduced levels of growth hormones. It is a RASopathy.

Beginning in early childhood, people with Costello syndrome have an increased risk of developing certain cancerous and noncancerous tumors. Small growths called papillomas are the most common noncancerous tumors seen with this condition. They usually develop around the nose and mouth or near the anus. The most frequent cancerous tumor associated with Costello syndrome is a soft tissue tumor called a rhabdomyosarcoma. Other cancers also have been reported in children and adolescents with this disorder, including a tumor that arises in developing nerve cells (neuroblastoma) and a form of bladder cancer (transitional cell carcinoma).

Costello Syndrome was discovered by Dr Jack Costello, a New Zealand Paediatrician in 1977. He is credited with first reporting the syndrome in the Australian Paediatric Journal, Volume 13, No.2 in 1977.

In the two predominant mutations of NSML (Y279C and T468M) the mutations cause a loss of catalytic activity of the SHP2 protein (the gene product of the "PTPN11" gene), which is a previously unrecognized behavior for this class of mutations. This interferes with growth factor and related signalling. While further research confirms this mechanism, additional research is needed to determine how this relates to all of the observed effects of NSML.

Most affected people have a stable clinical course but are often transfusion dependent.

Recurrence in siblings and apparent transmission from parent to child has long suggested a genetic defect with autosomal dominant inheritance and variable expression. Mutations in the Ras/mitogen activated protein kinase signaling pathways are known to be responsible for ~70% of NS cases.

A person with NS has up to a 50% chance of transmitting it to their offspring. The fact that an affected parent is not always identified for children with NS suggests several possibilities:

1. Manifestations could be so subtle as to go unrecognized (variable expressivity)

2. NS is heterogeneous, comprising more than one similar condition of differing causes, and some of these may not be inherited.

3. A high proportion of cases may represent new, sporadic mutations.

Heterozygous mutations in "NRAS", "HRAS", "BRAF", "SHOC2", "MAP2K1", "MAP2K2", and "CBL" have also been associated with a smaller percentage of NS and related phenotypes.

A condition known as "neurofibromatosis-Noonan syndrome" is associated with neurofibromin.

8p23.1 duplication syndrome is a rare genetic disorder caused by a duplication of a region from human chromosome 8. This duplication syndrome has an estimated prevalence of 1 in 64,000 births and is the reciprocal of the 8p23.1 deletion syndrome. The 8p23.1 duplication is associated with a variable phenotype including one or more of speech delay, developmental delay, mild dysmorphism, with prominent forehead and arched eyebrows, and congenital heart disease (CHD).

The duplication includes ~3.75 Mb between the distal and proximal ORDRs at either end of band 8p23.1. The copy number of the adjacent repeats may also be altered. The 8p23.1 duplication syndrome cannot be distinguished using conventional cytogenetics from high level copy number variation of the repeats themselves.

Both de novo cases and families with transmitted duplications from parents of both sex are known. The duplication is believed to arise de novo as a result of non-allelic homologous recombination (NAHR) between the proximal and distal ORDRs. NAHR is also thought to give rise to the reciprocal microdeletion syndrome, the polymorphic inversion between the ORDRs and a variety of other large scale abnormalities involving the short arm of chromosome 8.

Cri du chat syndrome, also known as chromosome 5p deletion syndrome, 5p− syndrome (pronounced "Five P Minus") or Lejeune’s syndrome, is a rare genetic disorder due to chromosome deletion on chromosome 5. Its name is a French term ("cat-cry" or "call of the cat") referring to the characteristic cat-like cry of affected children. It was first described by Jérôme Lejeune in 1963. The condition affects an estimated 1 in 50,000 live births across all ethnicities and is more common in females by a 4:3 ratio.

Low-set ears are ears with depressed positioning of the pinna two or more standard deviations below the population average.

It can be associated with conditions such as:

- Down's syndrome

- Turner Syndrome

- Noonan syndrome

- Patau syndrome

- DiGeorge syndrome

- Cri du chat syndrome

- Edwards syndrome

- Fragile X syndrome

It is usually bilateral, but can be unilateral in Goldenhar syndrome.

Marshall–Smith syndrome is not to be confused with:

- Marshall syndrome (aka.Periodic fever, aphthous stomatitis, pharyngitis and adenitis (PFAPA syndrome, see also: Periodic fever syndrome)

- Sotos (like) syndrome

- Weaver-Smith syndrome (WSS)

Respiratory complications are often cause of death in early infancy.

Acrocallosal syndrome (also known as ACLS) is a rare autosomal recessive syndrome characterized by corpus callosum agenesis, polydactyly, multiple dysmorphic features, motor and mental retardation, and other symptoms. The syndrome was first described by Albert Schinzel in 1979.

It is associated with "GLI3".

Chromosomal deletion syndromes result from deletion of parts of chromosomes. Depending on the location, size, and whom the deletion is inherited from, there are a few known different variations of chromosome deletions. Chromosomal deletion syndromes typically involve larger deletions that are visible using karyotyping techniques. Smaller deletions result in Microdeletion syndrome, which are detected using fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH)

Examples of chromosomal deletion syndromes include 5p-Deletion (cri du chat syndrome), 4p-Deletion (Wolf-Hirschhorn syndrome), Prader–Willi syndrome, and Angelman syndrome.

The 5q-syndrome is characterized by macrocytic anemia, often a moderate thrombocytosis, erythroblastopenia, megakaryocyte hyperplasia with nuclear hypolobation, and an isolated interstitial deletion of chromosome 5. The 5q- syndrome is found predominantly in females of advanced age.

Costello and Noonan syndrome are similar to CFC and their phenotypic overlap may be due to the biochemical relationship of the genes mutated in each syndrome to each other. Genes that are mutated in all three of these syndromes encode proteins that function in the MAP kinase pathway.

- Mutations that cause CFC are found in the KRAS, BRAF, MEK1 and MEK2 genes.

- Costello syndrome is caused by mutations in HRAS.

- Mutations that cause Noonan syndrome have been found in PTPN11 and SOS1.

The relative severity of CFC when compared to Noonan syndrome may reflect the position in the biochemical pathway each gene occupies.

- Shp2, the protein product of the PTPN11, appears to regulate the MAP kinase pathway at or above the level of SOS1.

- SOS1 in turn regulates the activities of RAS, RAF, MEK, ERK and p90RSK.

- SOS1 has been demonstrated to be a target of negative feedback by ERK and p90RSK.

Thus, any activating mutation downstream of SOS1 may be subject to less regulation that may mitigate the consequence of such mutations giving rise to the phenotypic differences seen between these syndromes.

The RASopathies are developmental syndromes caused by germline mutations (or in rare cases by somatic mosaicism) in genes that alter the Ras subfamily and mitogen-activated protein kinases that control signal transduction, including:

- Capillary malformation-AV malformation syndrome

- Autoimmune lymphoproliferative syndrome

- Cardiofaciocutaneous syndrome

- Hereditary gingival fibromatosis type 1

- Neurofibromatosis type 1

- Noonan syndrome

- Costello syndrome, Noonan-like

- Legius syndrome, Noonan-like

- Noonan syndrome with multiple lentigines, formerly called LEOPARD syndrome, Noonan-like

Acrocallosal syndrome (ACLS, ACS, Schinzel-Type) is a rare, heterogeneous, autosomal recessive disorder [3]. The heterogeneity of this condition refers to the multiple genes that may function to contribute to varying degrees of this syndrome [3] and is often linked to consanguinity [2,5]. Characteristics of this syndrome include agenesis of the corpus, macrocephaly, hypertelorism, polydactyly, mental and motor retardation [2], craniofacial dysmorphism, hallux dudplication [3], and sometimes palatal clefting [5]. It has also been reported that there are many similar signs and symptoms between ACLS, Greig cephalopolysyndactyly, and Hydrolethalus Syndrome (HLS), although there is little evidence to support common genetic causation at this point [3].

Males are twice as likely as females to have this characteristic, and it tends to run in families. In its non-symptomatic form, it is more common among Asians and Native Americans than among other populations, and in some families there is a tendency to inherit the condition unilaterally, that is, on one hand only.

The presence of a single transverse palmar crease can be, but is not always, a symptom associated with abnormal medical conditions, such as fetal alcohol syndrome, or with genetic chromosomal abnormalities, including Down Syndrome (chromosome 21), cri du chat syndrome (chromosome 5), Klinefelter syndrome, Wolf-Hirschhorn Syndrome, Noonan syndrome (chromosome 12), Patau syndrome (chromosome 13), IDIC 15/Dup15q (chromosome 15), Edward's syndrome (chromosome 18), and Aarskog-Scott syndrome (X-linked recessive), or autosomal recessive disorder, such as Leaukocyte adhesion deficiency-2 (LAD2). A unilateral single palmar crease was also reported in a case of chromosome 9 mutation causing Nevoid basal cell carcinoma syndrome and Robinow syndrome. It is also sometimes found on the hand of the affected side of patients with Poland Syndrome, and craniosynostosis.

Individuals with the disorder usually have distinctive malformations of the craniofacial area including an unusually large head (macrocephaly), prominent forehead, and abnormal narrowing of both sides of the forehead (bitemporal constriction); The nose can be upturned and short with a low nasal bridge; and large ears that are abnormally rotated toward the back of the head. In many cases, affected individuals also have downward slanting eyelid folds, widely spaced eyes, drooping of the upper eyelids, inward deviation of the eyes, and other eye abnormalities including absent eyebrows and eyelashes.

Cri du chat syndrome is due to a partial deletion of the short arm of chromosome number 5, also called "5p monosomy" or "partial monosomy." Approximately 90% of cases result from a sporadic, or randomly occurring, "de novo" deletion. The remaining 10-15% are due to unequal segregation of a parental balanced translocation where the 5p monosomy is often accompanied by a trisomic portion of the genome. These individuals may have more severe disease than those with isolated monosomy of 5p. A recent study suggests this may not be the case where a trisomy of chromosome 4q is involved.

Most cases involve total loss of the most distant 10-20% of the material on the short arm. Fewer than 10% of cases have other rare cytogenetic aberrations (e.g., interstitial deletions, mosaicisms, rings and "de novo" translocations). The deleted chromosome 5 is paternal in origin in about 80% of "de novo" cases. Loss of a small region in band 5p15.2 (cri du chat critical region) correlates with all the clinical features of the syndrome with the exception of the catlike cry, which maps to band 5p15.3 (catlike critical region). The results suggest that 2 noncontiguous critical regions contain genes involved in this condition's cause. Two genes in these regions, Semaphorine F (SEMA5A) and delta catenin (CTNND2), are potentially involved in cerebral development. The deletion of the telomerase reverse transcriptase (hTERT) gene localized in 5p15.33 may contribute to the phenotypic changes in cri du chat syndrome as well.

Microdeletion syndrome is a syndrome caused by a chromosomal deletion smaller than 5 million base pairs (5 Mb) spanning several genes that is too small to be detected by conventional cytogenetic methods or high resolution karyotyping (2–5 Mb). Detection is done by fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH). Larger chromosomal deletion syndromes are detectable using karyotyping techniques.

Recent findings in genetic research have suggested that a large number of genetic disorders, both genetic syndromes and genetic diseases, that were not previously identified in the medical literature as related, may be, in fact, highly related in the genetypical root cause of the widely varying, phenotypically-observed disorders. Such diseases are becoming known as ciliopathies. Known ciliopathies include primary ciliary dyskinesia, Bardet–Biedl syndrome, polycystic kidney and liver disease, nephronophthisis, Alström syndrome, Meckel–Gruber syndrome and some forms of retinal degeneration.

While not always pathological, it can present as a birth defect in multiple syndromes including:

- Catel–Manzke syndrome

- Bloom syndrome

- Coffin–Lowry syndrome

- congenital rubella

- Cri du chat syndrome

- DiGeorge's syndrome

- Ehlers-Danlos syndrome

- fetal alcohol syndrome

- Hallermann-Streiff syndrome

- Hemifacial microsomia (as part of Goldenhar syndrome)

- Juvenile idiopathic arthritis

- Marfan syndrome

- Noonan syndrome

- Pierre Robin syndrome

- Prader–Willi syndrome

- Progeria

- Russell-Silver syndrome

- Seckel syndrome

- Smith-Lemli-Opitz syndrome

- Treacher Collins syndrome

- Trisomy 13 (Patau syndrome)

- Trisomy 18 (Edwards syndrome)

- Wolf–Hirschhorn syndrome

- X0 syndrome (Turner syndrome)