Cure SMA and FAME (Families of SMA, Argentina) have awarded a $140,000 research grant to Alberto Kornblihtt, PhD, at the Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina, for his project, “Epigenetics in SMN2 E7 Alternative Splicing.” Epigenetics refers to changes that affect how much protein is produced from each gene, without altering the DNA sequence. Dr. Kornblihtt

Cure SMA has awarded a $75,000 research grant to Yong-Chao Ma, PhD, Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, for his project, “Regulation of Motor Neuron Defects by Cdk5 Signaling in SMA”. Dr. Ma and his team have found that the activity of a protein called Cdk5, cyclin-dependent kinase 5, is significantly increased

Cure SMA has awarded a $75,000 research grant Stephen J. Kolb at Ohio State University, for his project, “Arrested Development or Neurodegeneration? An approach to understand developmental motor neuron pathology in SMA”. Dr. Kolb and his team will create a large animal model of newborn infants with SMA. They will use this model to understand

Cure SMA has awarded a $75,000 research grant to Chris Lorson, PhD, at the University of Missouri, for his project, “Examining the role of astrocytes and the influence upon lower motor neuron susceptibility in SMA.” SMA is caused by a mutations in the SMN1 gene. This gene is expressed in every cell in the body;