Brain Health Institute gains MS researcher

The Universitys Brain Health Institute is expanding research on the treatment of brain disorders thanks to Cheryl Dreyfus, a leading multiple sclerosis researcher.

Dreyfus, professor and chair of the Department of Neuroscience and Cell Biology at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, said since she began working on models of the disease in tissue cultures, she hoped to approach a treatment for the autoimmune disease that affects about 350,000 people in the United States.

We really dont know well what MS is, but were finding growth factors that affect cells in development can also affect those cells that are dying in MS [patients], she said.

Dreyfus said her lab team is examining a protein called brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), which can help create new brain cells and prevent existing ones from dying.

In patients with MS, the myelin sheath, or protective covering that insulates brain cells, disintegrates, Dreyfus said, leading to symptoms ranging from muscle spasms and difficulty speaking to visual impairment and depression.

Many treatments for MS deal with treating inflammation that occurs when the sheath around the brain cells diminishes, Dreyfus said.

But her labs approach to finding a treatment focuses on recovering brain function, she said.

Her partnership with the BHI, which has an advisory board full of representatives from pharmaceutical companies including Johnson & Johnson and Merck, can help develop a more effective treatment for the disease, Dreyfus said.

Its extremely exciting because were hoping that well be able to think about our research in ways that we havent thought about before, she said. I dont have those kinds of connections in my own research world.

While Dreyfus aims to find an improved treatment for MS, she does not consider her work a search for the cure just yet.

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Brain Health Institute gains MS researcher