Wikimedia Commons Photo. Photo by Grcommons

GRAND RAPIDS Van Andel Institute hosted a scientific symposium Sept. 19-20 that gathered some of the worlds most noted experts in Parkinsons disease and reinforced the regions growing reputation in the field of Parkinsons research.

Grand Challenges in Parkinsons Disease features experts from a dozen nations including Australia, Malaysia and Sweden. The purpose of the event was to showcase the latest research in the field and to honor Andrew B. Singleton, of the National Institutes of Health with the first Jay Van Andel Award for Outstanding Achievement in Parkinsons Disease Research.

This is truly a gathering of some of the worlds greatest minds in Parkinsons disease research, said chief event organizer PatrikBrundin, M.D., chair of the Jay Van Andel Translational Parkinsons Disease Research Laboratory and Director of Van Andel Institutes Center for Neurodegenerative Science.

The event featured keynote addresses by noted Parkinsons experts Ted Dawson, M.D., of The Johns Hopkins University, who spoke on the topic of Looking Forward to Tomorrows Therapies for Parkinsons Disease, and Roger Barker, Ph.D., of University of Cambridge, who spoke on Matching Therapies to Patients: The Complexities of Disease Heterogeneity in Parkinsons Disease.

Dr. Andrew Singleton is best known for his work aimed at understanding the genetic causes of Parkinsons disease work that is opening entire new fields of research.

His first well-known work described the discovery of a duplication and triplicationof the alpha-synucleingene that causes a severe, early-onset form of Parkinsons disease. Scientists already knew that a few extremely rare mutant forms of the protein were bad, but Singleton showed that too much of the normal protein also has ramifications.

One year later he led the group that was the first to identify mutations in the LRRK2 gene as a cause of familial Parkinsons disease. Occasionally new mutations arise in this gene, which can explain some of the cases of the more common, sporadic Parkinsons disease.

For more information, please visit http://www.vai.org

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Van Andel Showcases Latest Parkinson’s Research