August 13, 2008

Harvard and Columbia scientists have for the first time used a new technique to transform an ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig’s disease) patient’s skin cells into motor neurons, a process that may be used in the future to create tailor-made cells to treat the debilitating disease. The research – led by Kevin Eggan, Ph.D. of the Harvard Stem Cell Institute and Chief Scientific Officer of the New York Stem Cell Foundation – will be published July 31 in the online version of the journal Science.

This is the first time that skin cells from a chronically-ill patient have been reprogrammed into a stem cell-like state, and then coaxed into the specific cell types that would be needed to understand and treat the disease. Though cell replacement therapies are probably still years away, the new cells will solve a problem that has hindered ALS research for years: the inability to study a patient’s motor neurons in the laboratory.

[Editor: Perhaps this technique could be used someday to study cellular differences in people with MS vs. controls.]