2024-01-31 06:16:09
Also called amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) affects around 30,000 people in the United States, and between 5,000 and 7,000 people in France. It causes progressive paralysis of the muscles, creating a state of confinement in the patient, and generally causes death in less than five years.
In the study published by the scientific journal PLOS Biology, a team of researchers says they have studied a way to target and stabilize a protein that protects cells from toxic elements from food or inhaling oxygen. In many cases, hereditary mutations in a gene that produces the protein in question are the cause of Charcot disease. But these mutations can also occur without a family history.
Mutations in this gene, SOD1, lead to poor assembly of the protein which prevents it from carrying out its tasks and disrupts the cellular machinery in the broad sense, leading to a clump of proteins which are also linked to, among other things, cancer. Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.
The new treatment is a “molecular stabilizer” that acts like a “stitch” and forces the protein to stay in its correct configuration, explained study director Jeffrey Agar, who discovered and tested this with his team. tool following 12 years of research.
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Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), better known as Charcot disease, affects 8,000 patients in France, according to the Association for Research on ALS. Its annual incidence amounts to 2.7 cases per 100,000 inhabitants. It is a rare neurodegenerative pathology which is characterized by the destruction of the neurons responsible for motor skills, the motor neurons.
90% of stabilized proteins
The molecule was tested on mice – genetically modified so that they carried the disease – and the researchers found that it not only restored the functions of the protein, but also stopped any secondary toxic effects.
Its effectiveness has also been proven in rats and dogs. It succeeded in stabilizing 90% of SOD1 proteins in blood cells and 60 to 70% in brain cells. The researchers now hope to obtain approval to move on to clinical trials in humans.
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