Open AccessGene-Environment-Time Interactions in Neurodegenerative Diseases: Hypotheses and Research Approaches
Author(s) -
Walter G. Bradley,
Angeline S. Andrew,
Bryan J. Traynor,
Adriano Chiò,
Tanya Butt,
Elijah W. Stommel
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
annals of neurosciences
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.545
H-Index - 19
eISSN - 0976-3260
pISSN - 0972-7531
DOI - 10.1159/000495321
Subject(s) - disease , amyotrophic lateral sclerosis , gene–environment interaction , bioinformatics , medicine , biology , gene , genetics , pathology , genotype
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), Alzheimer's, and Parkinson's diseases are age-related neurodegenerative diseases. ALS is not a single entity but a syndrome with many different causes. In all 3 diseases, gene mutations account for only 10-15% of cases. Many environmental and lifestyle factors have been implicated as risk factors for ALS, though none have been proven to cause the disease. It is generally believed that ALS results from interactions between environmental risk factors and genetic predisposing factors. The advent of next-generation sequencing and recent advances in research into environmental risk factors offer the opportunity to investigate these interactions.