Stem cells - a cure for fatal muscular dystrophy

Bonn: The diagnosis 'muscular dystrophy' is usually tantamount to a death sentence for those affected. One in three thousand male babies suffer from this incurable hereditary disease. The progress of the disease can only be slowed down through physiotherapy and medication. Scientists at Bonn University and at Pittsburgh Children's Hospital (USA) have now isolated a specific type of stem cell which can improve the regeneration of damaged muscle cells in mice suffering from muscular dystrophy. The results have now been published in the prestigious Journal of Cell Biology (Vol. 157 (5), pp. 851-864).

Muscle disease's genetic cause explored

Scimex: New Zealand, Australian and Dutch scientists have found out how a specific molecule switches on and off the genes that play a role in the muscle disease Facioscapulohumeral Muscular Dystrophy. The authors say that this information will help them understand how the molecule works normally and therefore how it fails to work in people with the disease.