Israeli researchers announced on Tuesday that they uncovered a key mechanism that causes the neurodegenerative disease ALS, in a study published in the journal Nature Communications.
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This breakthrough could unlock a way to delay or reverse the condition which affects hundreds of thousands of people worldwide.
The team consisted of researchers from Tel Aviv University and Sheba Medical Center in central Israel, as well as from institutes in Germany, France, Britain and the United States.
They found that a buildup of a protein called TDP-43 near neuromuscular junctions – which translate neural signals into motor activity – causes neurons to degenerate and die.
As a result, this leads to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as Lou Gehrig's Disease, which causes the loss of the ability to walk, talk, or even breathe.
"The paralysis caused by the disease results from damage to the motor neurons, which leads to the degeneration of nerve endings and to the loss of muscle innervation," said Prof. Eran Perlson, who led the study with doctoral students Topaz Altman and Ariel Ionescu.
"Until now, we could not understand the basic biological mechanism causing the initial damage behind this vicious cascade," he added.
The scientists were able to restore motor neuron activity using an experimental molecule to break down TDP-43 in animals.
Perlson explained that the discovery could "lead to the development of new therapies… and thereby heal the nerve cells before the irreversible damage that occurs in the spinal cord."
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