News

Some forms of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) could actually be caused by an infectious virus, with scientists reporting that human endogenous retrovirus-K (HERV-K), normally dormant, has been found in an active form in the postmortem brain cells of certain individuals with ALS. Experiments using the active HERV-K in cells grown in…

The winners of the DREAM ALS Stratification Prize4Life Challenge were recently announced by Prize4Life, Sage Bionetworks and the DREAM community. The challenge is a global data analysis competition designed to computationally determine the different subgroups of patients who suffer from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). There is currently…

A large-sample study investigating a possible association between anxiety-depressive disorders in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis/motor neuron disease (ALS/MND) in the People’s Republic of China was recently conducted. The study, entitled “Frequency and risk factor analysis of cognitive and anxiety-depressive disorders in patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis/motor neuron disease,” was published in…

A recent study from researchers in Canada and Japan describes a new possible target for the treatment of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). The paper, titled “Ubiquilin-2 drives NF-κB activity and cytosolic TDP-43 aggregation in neuronal cells,” appeared on Oct. 31 in the journal Molecular Brain.

Neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) all share a disease hallmark, the aggregation of “misfolded” proteins. Understanding the molecular processes underlying protein aggregation and how it leads to disease is an important step toward developing new therapies. Now, researchers at the University of Cambridge, in…

Japanese researchers have found possible biomarkers that could aid in the early detection of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). The report, titled “Identification of plasma microRNAs as a biomarker of sporadic Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis” appeared on Oct. 24 in the journal Molecular Brain. In ALS…

Researchers at the University of Edinburgh studied the effect of the hormone serotonin in the regeneration of motor neurons after spinal cord injury that may one day hold implications in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), part of a large group of motor neuron diseases. The research paper, entitled “Serotonin Promotes Development…

Because amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is such a devastating disease, there is a need for novel and efficacious therapies and several studies hypothesize that growth hormone may be one of them. In a new review paper titled “The neuroprotective effects of human growth hormone as a potential treatment for amyotrophic lateral…

A consortium dedicated to finding a cure for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), comprised of ALS ACT, The ALS Association, ALS Finding a Cure, and the Translational Research Advancing Therapy ALS (TREAT ALS™) Northeast ALS Consortium (NEALS), has just announced the official start of acceptance of proposals for Phase II clinical trials for potentially groundbreaking treatments for the disease.

An ALS Association-sponsored meeting, held at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in Huntington, New York, brought together expert researchers to discuss three main themes in current amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) research: antisense therapy, gene therapy and stem cell therapy. Recent ALS therapeutic approaches have not been very successful, with only one drug,…