Facioscapulohumeral Muscular Dystrophy News and Research

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GSK, Fred Hutch to develop therapeutics against facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy

Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and GlaxoSmithKline PLC (GSK) today announced a partnership to develop therapeutics to treat an inherited form of muscular dystrophy.

11 Dec 2012

New DNA-reading technology could lead to correct genetic diagnosis for muscle-wasting diseases

Scientists at The University of Nottingham have used a revolutionary new DNA-reading technology for a research project that could lead to correct genetic diagnosis for muscle-wasting diseases.

6 Mar 2012

BioTime to market muscle progenitor cell lines bearing hereditary diseases

BioTime, Inc. today announced that it has elected to market progenitors of muscle stem cells bearing hereditary diseases. BioTime will produce the products from five human embryonic stem (hES) cell lines from Reproductive Genetics Institute (RGI) of Chicago, Illinois.

4 Jan 2012

Third Annual Cape Cod Walk 'n' Roll for FSH Muscular Dystrophy on October 1

Tomorrow, October 1, 2011, FSHD patients and their friends, advocates, and families will join in the Third Annual Cape Cod Walk 'n' Roll for FSHD.

1 Oct 2011

New treatment strategy for dominant forms of muscular dystrophy

Investigators at The Research Institute at Nationwide Children's Hospital are studying a potential new treatment strategy for dominant forms of muscular dystrophy, thanks to preliminary funding from The Ohio State University Center for Clinical and Translational Science.

12 Sep 2011

MDA announces $13.7M in grants to 40 new muscular dystrophy research initiatives

The Muscular Dystrophy Association today announced funding, totaling $13.7 million, for 40 new research initiatives targeting nearly two dozen progressive neuromuscular diseases.

24 Aug 2011

Study finds genetic change in chromosome 4 causes FSHD

The Muscular Dystrophy Association today heralds a landmark muscular dystrophy advance by an international study team of scientists and physicians from the Netherlands, United States, France and Spain. Led by MDA-grantee Silvère van der Maarel, Ph.D., at Leiden University Medical Center in the Netherlands, the collaborative study of more than 2,300 people found that two distinct genetic changes on chromosome 4 must be present to cause facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy (FSHD).

21 Aug 2010

FSH society applauds findings of facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy

This is what we have all been working towards and fighting for, says Daniel Paul Perez, co-founder, president and CEO of the FSH Society and a 48-year-old patient with facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy (FSHD), applauding the researchers whose study on yesterday's ScienceXpress, the journal Science's online advanced edition, pinpoints for the first time the exact genetic mechanism triggering FSHD, the most common muscular dystrophy.

21 Aug 2010

Scientists discover genetic flaw that causes facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy

Nearly two decades after they identified the specific genetic flaw that causes a common type of muscular dystrophy, scientists believe they have figured out how that flaw brings about the disease. The finding by an international team of researchers settles a longstanding question about the roots of facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy or FSHD.

20 Aug 2010

Medication used to treat heart arrhythmias also reduces myotonic dystrophy: Researchers

A medication most often used to treat heart arrhythmias also reduces a central symptom of myotonic dystrophy, the most common type of muscular dystrophy in adults.

5 May 2010

MDA, FFSHR award $200,000 grant for developing FSH dystrophy therapy

The Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA), headquartered in Tucson, Ariz., and Friends of FSH Research (FFSHR), based in Kirkland, Wash., has jointly awarded a two-year, $200,000 grant to Dr. Joel Chamberlain, a research assistant professor of medical genetics at the University of Washington. The grant, equally funded by the two organizations, will enable the laboratory led by Dr. Chamberlain to study RNA interference as an investigative and therapeutic tool for facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy.

7 Apr 2010

Gene delivery strategy to help improve muscle mass in patients with degenerative muscle disorders

Severe weakness of the quadriceps is a defining feature of several neuromuscular disorders. Researchers at Nationwide Children's Hospital have shown that a gene delivery strategy that produces follistatin - a naturally occurring protein that inhibits myostatin, a growth factor expressed specifically in skeletal muscle - directly to the quadriceps of non-human primates results in long-term gene expression with muscle enhancing effects, including larger muscles with greater strength.

12 Nov 2009

NIH to fund grants for epigenetic research

The National Institutes of Health announced today that it will fund 22 grants on genome-wide studies of how epigenetic changes -- chemical modifications to genes that result from diet, aging, stress, or environmental exposures -- define and contribute to specific human diseases and biological processes.

17 Sep 2009

Researchers identify gene linked to skeletal muscle disease and vision deficits

Skeletal muscle disease and vision deficits might seem unrelated, but a frog model of muscular dystrophy shows it is not such a leap.

22 Apr 2009