Two non-profit organizations, ALS Association and Prize4Life, have joined forces to launch a new challenge grant program called The ALS Assistive Technology Challenge. Inaugurated with an initial investment of close to $500,000, the new program intends to support research projects focused on new communication technology solutions for patients who suffer from…

University of Toronto (UT) researchers have uncovered the main genetic cause of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and frontotemporal dementia (FTD), a discovery that will lead to the development of new efficacious treatments. The work entitled, “Isoform-specific antibodies reveal distinct subcellular localizations of C9orf72 in amyotrophic lateral…

Scientists at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital may have unlocked the key to understanding amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and other similar diseases of the nervous system. The study, titled “Phase Separation by Low Complexity Domains Promotes Stress Granule Assembly and Drives Pathological Fibrillization,” appeared in the September…

In a recent report published in the PLOS One journal entitled “Transforming Growth Factor Beta (TGF-β) Is a Muscle Biomarker of Disease Progression in ALS and…

Dr. Christopher Donnelly, PhD, is the first recruit for the University of Pittsburgh Brain Institute’s new Live Like Lou Center for ALS Research. A neurobiologist who co-led a study investigating hexanucleotide repeat expansion (HRE) which scientists say is the most common cause of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) and…

In a recent paper entitled “Spinal Locomotor Circuits Develop Using Hierarchical Rules Based on Motorneuron Position and Identity” published in the Neuron journal, a team of researchers from the Salk Institute for Biological Sciences, La Jolla, CA and the University of Texas,…

Synapse Biomedical Inc., a company that commercializes the NeuRx Diaphragm Pacing System (DPS), has recently announced it will be presenting data on the company’s Post Approval Study (PAS), a multi-center trial that demonstrated DPS’s safety and survival benefit, during the 26th International Symposium on ALS/MND. Data will be presented by Dr. Robert Miller, Principal Investigator of the…

Researchers at Università degli Studi di Milano in Italy recently published in the journal Cells a review regarding the link between autophagy and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). The study is entitled “Autophagy and Neurodegeneration: Insights from a Cultured Cell Model of ALS”. Autophagy…

Social media sensation The Ice Bucket Challenge (an event that raised awareness for ALS) is celebrating its one-year anniversary, with the Project A.L.S. reporting it has now spent 100 percent of the donations raised during the 6-week challenge period on several research projects that have already revealed promising results. Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a fatal and progressive…

A study led by researchers at The Center of Free Radical and Biomedical Research at Universidad de la Republica in Uruguay revealed that antioxidant therapies like MitoQ are a promising treatment strategy for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). The study was published in the journal Free Radical Biology…