Advancing knowledge of human development, developmental disabilities, and neurodegenerative diseases.
A new test may spur advances in drug discovery for a rare and debilitating neurological disorder. Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease, a rare inherited neurological disorder, affects more than 2.8 million people around the globe.
CMT is equally common among all ages, genders, and races and is one of the most common heritable neurological impairments. The symptoms present as neuropathy, foot drop, poor balance, difficulty with dexterity, or abnormal sensation – just to name a few.
Our goal was to define the genetic cause of the profound hypomyelination in the taiep rat model and determine its relevance to human white matter disease.
Several Waisman Center investigators played key roles in crafting research proposals that were recently selected as ‘cluster hires’ by the University of Wisconsin–Madison. UW–Madison’s Cluster Hiring Initiative was launched in 1998 as an innovative partnership between the university, state and the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation (WARF). According to the UW–Madison Office of the Provost, the …
Peripheral nerve regeneration after injury is dependent upon implementation of a novel genetic program in Schwann cells that supports axonal survival and regeneration.
Waisman Center investigator John Svaren collaborated with Ian Duncan, a professor of veterinary medicine at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, and others on a study that offers new insight into a rare human disease, called H-ABC, which can affect many parts of the brain and can lead to severe neurologic dysfunction. You can read more about …
Every day, Waisman Center researcher John Svaren deals with nerves – peripheral nerves, that is. Peripheral nerves connect the brain and spinal cord to our limbs and organs, serving as vital communication relays that allow us to sense and respond to the world around us. “These nerves are really interesting because they contain some of …
Title: The Sox10 transcriptional regulator binds genes important for myelin formation in both oligodendrocytes of the spinal cord and Schwann cells in peripheral nerves. Legend: The diagram shows data from next generation sequencing techniques (known as ChIP-seq) to identify elements of DNA controlled by Sox10, which is required for formation of myelin in the central …
John Svaren, PhD’s paper “Genome editing-enabled HTS assays expand drug target pathways for Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease,” examines how the use of genome editing places his research one step closer to a potential cure for Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease.
Researchers funded by the National Institutes of Health have discovered how a defect in a single master gene disrupts the process by which several genes interact to create myelin, a fatty coating that covers nerve cells and increases the speed and reliability of their electrical signals.
