Researchers
at Johns Hopkins University recently released findings related to the ability
to manipulate brain cells in test tube studies. The purpose was to determine if
new drugs might be used to stop the brain-destroying impact of a genetic
mutation at work in some forms to two incurable diseases: Dementia and ALS (amyotrophic lateral
sclerosis or Lou Gehrig's disease ALS, sometimes
known as Lou Gehrig's disease, named for the Yankee baseball great who died
from it, which destroys nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord that control
voluntary muscle movement.)
Traditionally, “Efforts to treat neurodegenerative
diseases have the highest failure rate for all clinical trials,” says J. D. Rothstein MD, PhD, professor of
neurology and neuroscience at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine
and leader of the research described online in the journal Neuron. The
research was funded by grants from several organizations including the National
Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke.
This is very good news. In the future, this may mean that scientists analyze
cerebral spinal fluid from patients with dementia and ALS in a new way. These
may pave the way to develop markers that can be studied by clinicians to see if
the treatment is working once the drug therapy is moved to clinical trials.
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