Scientists Find a Way To Target the Protein Behind Huntington's Disease

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Huntington's disease is caused by a dominant mutation, meaning that anyone who inherits it will develop the disease. Symptoms typically start when people are in their 30s, and those include dementia and the loss of motor control. Despite having identified the gene decades ago, we've struggled to find a way to use that knowledge to make patients' lives better. The protein that is produced by the damaged gene is so similar to the normal version that targeting it has proven nearly impossible. But now, scientists in China have devised a way to specifically get rid of the damaged protein. They've identified molecules that can link the damaged form of the protein to a system that cells use to target proteins for digestion and recycling. Tests in mice and flies seem to indicate that this is enough to reverse many of the problems caused by the Huntington's mutation. The findings have been published in the journal Nature.

This could help so many people if true

[passionplay]

I certainly hope this is true and is verifiable. Hopefully China will share the research results freely.

Re: This could help so many people if true

[backslashdot]

Uh its published in a journal, you can duplicate the experiments.

The only restriction can be that they patent it so you need their permission to make this treatment legally.

Re: This could help so many people if true

[RightSaidFred99]

For sure, it would be horrible if some thief stole China's IP.

Re: This could help so many people if true

[The Evil Atheist]

Jokes on you - you made the stupid system that allows people to hide medicine behind patents. You think merely stealing their IP is going to make it cheap in your country?

Sharing freely is so much better than stealing

[passionplay]

I'm not saying there aren't other ways to acquire the information. I'm saying that humanitarian information like this should not be milked but rather should be shared to improve the world. Not everything should be for profit and power. Somethings can be for altruistic reasons. However, I also know that humans are vile creatures that are self-serving in the extreme - we all are at times - some more than others. So I'm sure it'll end up being some combinationor sharing and stealing.

Re:

[K. S. Kyosuke]

you can duplicate the experiments

More accurately, you can hope to be able to do that.

Re:

[hdyoung]

If they published it in Nature, both the basic concept and the details have already been shared. Nature is one of the top scientific journals on the planet. You don;t get to "hold back" important info and still get published published in Nature. The editors won't allow it.

Lots of things work in Mice that don't in humans, so it's not a huge breakthrough...... yet. If it works in humans, it'll be a huge win for Chinese science. And rightfully so. People have been working on this for decades and getting n

Re:

[NicknameUnavailable]

I thought they copy everything, and that they don't know how to discover or invent new things

There's a first for everything.

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[alvinrod]

I've heard that there's also a big problem in China with faked study results. While they're not unique in that regard, there's been some serious issues reproducing their results.

Hopefully this turns out to be good though. If it is we can just steal it from them and stare, just stare, at them if they even make a peep about it.

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[dgatwood]

Lately, there are serious problems reproducing a lot of medical research [wikipedia.org], unfortunately, not just that from China.

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[An0nYm0u5c0wArD]

You mean like how they stole the formula for black powder from the U.S.A. back in the 900s?

How old were the scientists?

[Tehrasha]

Based on previous articles, this is frighteningly important.

Re:

[HiThere]

I'm rather sure the current moderation the parent has of "Troll" is due to Poe's law. To me it reads as clearly sarcasm.

It's too late for 13 (House M.D.)

[itsgameoverman]

Seriously though, it's awesome news.

Re:

[passionplay]

If you want to see 13, just go watch one of her movies. She's done a slew of them since Tron: Legacy.

Re:

[An0nYm0u5c0wArD]

Yeah, but she won't do anything new because she's dead now. HD is a bitch. :(

Alzheimer's

[xluap]

Something like this might work for Alzheimer's disease.