But Columbia scientist Serge Przedborski, co-director of the Center for Motor Neuron Biology and Disease, and his colleagues showed that non-neuronal support cells called astrocytes that carry the mutant form of the ALS gene can on their own cause normal motor neurons to get sick and die. That means, said Przedborski, that astrocytes are intimately involved in the disease process. If so, this discovery could provide a new route to developing treatments to prevent or slow the disease.
