UI Researchers Find Possible New Drug to Treat ALS: Wider Use Unknown
By Cindy Hadish, The Gazette, Cedar Rapids, Iowa
Jan. 25–IOWA CITY — University of Iowa researchers identified a new protein interaction and a drug that slows the progression of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis — Lou Gehrig’s disease — in mice and nearly doubles the animals’ life span.
Researchers who participated in the discovery are cautiously opti mistic the findings could lead to a drug to treat some forms of the disease, also known as ALS.
John Engelhardt, professor and head of anatomy and cell biology in the UI Carver College of Medicine, said only the inherited form of ALS could be studied, which accounts for just 5 percent of patients, and the form studied was a subset of that 5 percent.
ALS damages motor neurons — nerve cells that control muscle movement — in the brain and spinal cord, eventually leading to paralysis and death.
Researchers led by Engelhardt identified a specific interaction between superoxide dismutase-1, a protein that is mutated in inherited forms of ALS, and a protein that regulates the production of reactive oxygen species.
Engelhardt likened the mecha nism to a thermostat by which the protein turns on and off the cellular “machinery” that makes reactive oxygen species.
Patients with ALS cannot turn off the production of reactive oxygen species — important components of the immune system — which causes more inflammation,
he said, “like throwing too much wood on the fire.” Previous research showed that the machinery is overactive, but no one knew why it was so.
The researchers also identified a drug, apocynin, that slows disease progression and increases the life span of mice with the inherited form of ALS.
Engelhardt said it is unknown if the science could apply to the other 95 percentof cases, known as “sporadic ALS,” and if the drug would work the same way on humans as it does on mice.
“We have to be careful about making that comparison,” he said.
Testing on humans could be three years away.
The study was published online Thursday in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.
Research was funded in part by the Roy J. Carver Charitable Trust of Muscatine and the National Institutes of Health.
¦Contact the writer: (319) 398-8428 or cindy.hadish@gazettecommunications.com
—–
To see more of The Gazette, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.gazetteonline.com.
Copyright (c) 2008, The Gazette, Cedar Rapids, Iowa
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.