Dear Gopal,

glad 2 hear that ur mum is doing fine...
I was able 2 get Carnitine tabs but nt the injections.
Sorry about that.
Let me know if you still need the tabs...

Tc and keep in touch...

G..

--- In ALS_India@yahoogroups.com, Gopala Krishna Gokeda <gokeda@...> wrote:
>
> Hi Lalit,
>
> Please feel free to call me. My phone number is 705-293-0323 and 705-888-1246.
My mother is doing very well. I am having hard time getting the carnitine
injections to India. I am still working on them.
>
> Gopal
>
>
>
>
>
> --- On Fri, 3/6/09, Lalit Kumar <lalitgupta907@...> wrote:
>
> From: Lalit Kumar <lalitgupta907@...>
> Subject: Re: [ALS_India] WHY THE NEW GENE FINDINGS ARE A CALL TO ACTION - A
PACKARD PERSPECTIVE
> To: ALS_India@yahoogroups.com
> Date: Friday, March 6, 2009, 10:24 PM
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> hello gaurav bhaiya
> Do you know any thing about gopal's mother...one thing i want to know once
gopal told me about his neighbour in canada that the person was able to cure his
wife from MND by giving injection of l-carnitine. ..Do u know any thing about
this context????? ??Also do u have any phone no 4 contacting him... want to know
about that lady who was able to cure 4m this prob.....can u do any help regardig
this....If gopal got this mail kindly respond me..
>
>  
> thanx
>  
> lalit
>
>  
> On 3/5/09, gauravjain_80 <gauravjain_80@ yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> WHY THE NEW GENE FINDINGS ARE A CALL TO ACTION - A PACKARD PERSPECTIVE
> http://www.alscente r.org/news/ briefs/090304. cfm
>
>
> In 2003, when New England ALS scientists announced they'd discovered
> another form of familial ALS - the sixth one, and an adult form that
> seems to strike harder in the lower extremities and have a somewhat
>
> faster course - the hope was that the gene for it would soon surface.
>
> High excitement in the ALS research community always accompanies
> finding a new gene: Perhaps this one holds clues to reveal what triggers
>
> motor neuron death; perhaps this one will spark a really effective
> therapy.
>
> Last week, after a six-year search, the gene was announced by seasoned
> collaborators at the University of Massachusetts and Massachusetts
>
> General Hospital. Another research team at King's College in London
> backed up the finding. Found where they'd suspected it, on chromosome
> 16, the mutated FUS gene (for "fused in sarcoma") is responsible for
>
> perhaps 5 percent of familial ALS. And pinpointing it, after a long,
> thorough search, would be news enough.
>
> But this discovery appears to go beyond the usual. Packard scientists
> warmly welcome the appearance of m(for mutated) FUS for a key reason: It
>
> lends clout to a theory about a major destructive process in ALS that's
> been gathering evidence at the Packard Center and elsewhere more than a
> decade.
>
> "The fascinating thing about having the FUS gene linked to ALS," says
>
> Packard Scientific Director Piera Pasinelli, "is that it's yet another
> gene that plays a part in RNA processing."
>
> And having successful functioning of that molecule is crucial for cells
> to work normally. By way of background: RNA - specifically the messenger
>
> RNA molecule - carries DNA's blueprint for assembling proteins into the
> cell cytoplasm where their actual assembly occurs. Yet getting RNA to
> reflect DNA's "message" accurately, modifying it for efficiency and then
>
> transporting it from the cell nucleus to the cytoplasm is an involved,
> multi-step process. And it's a one that can go awry.
>
> In 1998, Packard scientists first published the find that some 65
> percent ALS patients harbor abnormal messenger RNA molecules,
>
> specifically in the injured parts of their central nervous systems. But
> no one has known the cause of that or what, if any, part it plays in
> ALS's downhill course.
>
> More evidence: Not long ago, Packard researchers helped discover the
>
> familial ALS4 gene, one for an abnormal form of a protein called
> senataxin. Like FUS, the senataxin gene also has an RNA role, overseeing
> proper production of messenger RNA from its DNA blueprint.
>
> And last year, the King's College group showed mutations in yet another
>
> gene - one called TDP-43 - that appears both in patients with a variety
> of different familial ALS types and, amazingly, in sporadic ALS patients
> as well. Healthy people lack these mutations. (Last week, Packard
> scientist Wim Robberecht and his European team added to that,
>
> discovering a new variation of the TDP-gene in familial ALS patients.)
> *
>
> Among TDP-43's list of accomplishments? RNA processing.
>
> All this suggests that flawed RNA metabolism, then, may join ALS's
>
> seven "ugly stepsisters," as another of the biological pathways to go
> wrong in ALS. (In scientific terms, the seven stepsisters are: oxidative
> damage, misfolded protein aggregates, dysfunctional mitochondria,
>
> defects in motor neuron transport, growth factor deficiency, pathology
> of glial cells, glutamate excitotoxicity. )
>
> What has Packard scientists most engaged, however, is where the flawed
> RNA metabolism could lead. It's interesting, for example, that both
>
> patients with ALS from mTDP-43 and those with ALS from mFUS appear to
> show clumps of misfolded proteins - protein aggregates - in central
> nervous system cells, early in the disease. "This suggests that these
>
> aggregates are key agents, that they participate early in the genesis of
> ALS," says Packard scientist Phil Wong, who has just made a mouse model
> of ALS using a mutant TDP-43 gene.
>
> So an important next step, both for understanding and for therapy, Wong
>
> says, is to "see whether these aggregates are indeed critical players or
> if, instead, they're just `tombstones' that mark dying motor neurons."
> His mouse model should help answer that question.
>
>
> In this, the new "stepsister" may be the most useful. Because it shows
> up in both familial and sporadic patients, some researchers are even
> speculating that RNA gone awry may be the missing overarching principle
>
> that tells how the stepsisters are related. In other words, some are
> hoping it may be the key process that causes ALS.
>
> "The new discoveries, we believe, point strongly to flawed RNA
> metabolism as a key disease process to imitate in animal models for
>
> ALS," says Rothstein.
>
> "It's these tools - the gene-primed model mice and fish and fruit flies
> that Packard scientists offer the world's research community - that will
> enable us to understand ALS. Ultimately, they'll become the agents we'll
>
> all use to find effective therapies."
>
> *Robberecht is already busy making a zebrafish model of ALS using
> mutant TDP-43. His Packard colleague J. Paul Taylor, has begun testing a
> new TDP-43 fruit fly model.
>
>
> ____________ _________ _________ _____
>
> About The Robert Packard Center for ALS Research at Johns Hopkins
> www.alscenter. org
>
>
> Located in Baltimore, the Robert Packard Center for ALS Research at
> Johns Hopkins is a worldwide collaboration of scientists aimed at
> developing therapies and a cure for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS),
> also known as Lou Gehrig's disease.
>
>
> The Center is the only institution of its kind dedicated solely to the
> disease. Its research is meant to translate rapidly from the lab bench
> to the clinic, largely by eliminating time spent waiting for grants and
>
> lowering institutional barriers to sharing scientific results.
>
> Scientists and clinician members of the Packard Center have moved drugs
> reliably and rapidly from preclinical experiments to human trials.
> Direct or indirect links to international biotech or pharmaceutical
>
> companies bring the infrastructure and experience needed to make
> promising drugs into therapies.
>
> Packard scientists are the first to propose and test a combination
> approach to drug therapy, a tactic that has worked for AIDS, cancer and
>
> other diseases.
>
> ALS is a progressive, disabling neuromuscular disease that causes
> complete paralysis and loss of function - including the ability to eat,
> speak and breathe. ALS progresses quickly and is not curable. Most
>
> patients die within five years of diagnosis.
>
> ____________ _________ _________ _________ __
> Rebecca Berger
> Research Program Coordinator
> Robert Packard Center for ALS Research at Johns Hopkins
> 5801 Smith Avenue | McAuley Suite 110
>
> Baltimore, MD 21209
> 410.735.7678 direct
> 410.735.7680 fax
> rberger6@jhmi. edu
> www.alscenter. org
>
> www.fiesta5K. org
>