Identifying and mapping out neurological signatures in MND to find key pathways as targets for therapies.
Principal Investigator: Dr Bradley Smith
Lead Institution: King's College London
MND Association Funding: £199,562
Funding dates: May 2022 - October 2024
About the project
This project aims to identify signatures of disease in the nervous system in post-mortem tissue from people with MND that had changes within common and rare MND associated genes. Specifically, the project will look at key players within RNA (photocopy of DNA) biology such as RNA Binding Proteins. Once possible signatures have been identified, the project will move on to seeing if these signatures were also present in MND cases with an unknown genetic cause. This will help to establish whether the signatures might be present in people with MND who have unknown genetic causes as well as those with known mutations. It may also help to highlight new pathways of disease which could then become targets for future potential therapies.
What could this mean for MND research?
Increasing our understanding of what may happen in the disease and the biological pathways that could be involved, might lead to new therapeutic targets being found. Discovering new drug targets means that potential treatments can be developed and tested, which might help correct the damage being caused in neurons in MND. This study will increase the understanding of biological pathways, uncovering more clues into the causes of MND and may aid in the development of new treatments for people living with MND.
Resources
Project code: 881-791