MDA Makes Grants to Duke Researchers
Investigating Muscle Diseases

TUCSON, Ariz., July 20, 2007 — Researchers at Duke University Medical Center in Durham, N.C., recently were awarded grants totaling some $217,000 to continue important research into the mechanisms underlying muscle diseases.

At its annual meeting in Los Angeles, last week, the Muscular Dystrophy Association Board of Directors approved grants to researchers Paul Rosenberg and Vann Bennett.

The $106,000 grant to Rosenberg will continue funding of an investigation into the influence of calcium on gene transcription in muscle cells. The $111,082 grant to Bennett continues funding investigations of the role of ankyrin-B in congenital myopathy and cellular targeting of dystroglycan. This research may uncover mechanisms for forms of muscular dystrophy that currently aren’t understood, leading to therapeutic strategies.

MDA’s neuromuscular clinic at Duke Medical Center, founded in 1979, is co-directed by physicians Donald B. Sanders and E. Wayne Massey.

Since 1996, the MDA/ALS Center at Duke has provided specialized treatment for and research into amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (Lou Gehrig’s disease). The Center is directed by Richard S. Bedlack Jr.

Over the years, MDA has made grants totaling $13.6 million for muscle disease research at Duke, in addition to providing some $2 million for clinic operation.

“It wouldn’t be possible to fund vitally important research such as this, were it not for the generosity of the American public,” said MDA Medical Director and Vice President of Research Valerie A. Cwik. “Donations made to MDA during the WRAL-TV broadcast on the Jerry Lewis Labor Day Telethon and throughout the year have a concrete impact in the fight against neuromuscular diseases.”

MDA is a voluntary health agency working to defeat more than 40 neuromuscular diseases through programs of worldwide research, comprehensive services and far-reaching professional and public health information. It operates 225 neuromuscular disease clinics across the country.