It ’s been two year since we all dumped pail of freeze pee on our top dog to enkindle money for ALS research — and it turns out all of those pathetic videos actually paid off . TheALS Associationused a portion of the money invoke by the methamphetamine hydrochloride bucket challenge to fund the research initiative Project MinE , which led to the find of NEK1 , a previously unknown gene associated with amyotrophic lateral induration ( ALS or Lou Gehrig ’s disease ) , a more and more degenerative neurological disease that kills most of its dupe within five eld of diagnosing .
Since 2011 , researchers withProject MinE — who write their findings this week in the journalNature — have been working to sequence the genomes of masses with and without ALS so as to better understand the genes associated with the disease . A $ 1 million contribution from the ALS Association cater Project MinE researchers with the financial resource postulate for desoxyribonucleic acid sequencing .
With the help of 80 research worker in 11 countries , the work writer were able-bodied to determine that NEK1 was linked to ALS in both transmissible and sporadic cases of the disease . ( While familial ALS is inherited , sporadic ALS can feign anyone ; it account for more than 90 percentage of cases in the U.S. ) Previous inquiry has shown that NEK1 has a ambit of roles in neurons , which are all disrupted by the disease .
The gene is n’t present in all example of ALS , researchers say . Nor is NEK1 the first gene linked to ALS . In fact , The New York Timesnotes , 30 gene tied to the disease have already been discovered . Nevertheless , NEK1 look to be present in a significant act of ALS slip and could help lead researchers to new treatment .
“ The sophisticated gene analysis that led to this finding was only potential because of the large number of ALS samples uncommitted , ” Lucie Bruijn of the ALS Association explain in astatement . “ The ALS Ice Bucket Challenge start the ALS Association to invest in Project MinE ’s work to create magnanimous biorepositories of ALS biosamples that are designed to allow for on the nose this kind of enquiry and to produce exactly this kind of result . ”
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