Scientists cure paralysis in mice

Posted by greg
May 26, 2009

Scientists in Australia have cured Floppy Baby Syndrome in mice – for the first time. The team had been searching for the genes that caused the syndrome so that drugs could them be used to possibly correct the problem. Muscular actin was found to be missing in the children with this syndrome, and in it’s place heart actin was used in their bodies. this caused the babies to quickly lose control over most of their muscles and essentially were quadriplegics after a few months of life. Once the heart actin was found, the scientists worked on a method to turn on the heart actin in the muscles. After considerable trial and error, they were able, using genetic engineering techniques, to turn on the heart actin in the standard muscle fibers and were successful in mice. Mice that typically would die after a few days were found to live standard lives (about 2 years) after the genetic engineering was used on them. The next step was to find a drug that duplicated the genetic work they created for the mice so that it would be safe for humans. They are presently screening over 1000 already approved

drugs in the hopes of finding a medication that will turn on the heart actin so that human trials could begin. (Source: Science Alert.com)

It is great to hear that scientists are finally making significant breakthroughs in medicine using  genetic engineering. This first success can be used as a template for other diseases that have no treatment or cure. Continued mapping of the human genome along with what the genes do appears to be the holy grail of medicine in the 21st century. Once we understand what the genes do and compare that to the diseases, we can finally start to look for medicines, plants, and other extracts that either repair or switch genes so that they perform correctly.

Medical, Outside America

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