PUBLICATION

Simple animal models for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis drug discovery

Authors
Patten, S.A., Parker, J.A., Wen, X.Y., Drapeau, P.
ID
ZDB-PUB-160602-5
Date
2016
Source
Expert opinion on drug discovery   11(8): 797-804 (Review)
Registered Authors
Keywords
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, Drosophila, chemical genetics, drug discovery, C. elegans, zebrafish
MeSH Terms
  • Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis/drug therapy*
  • Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis/genetics
  • Animals
  • Animals, Genetically Modified
  • Caenorhabditis elegans
  • Disease Models, Animal
  • Drosophila
  • Drug Design*
  • Drug Discovery/methods*
  • Humans
  • Molecular Targeted Therapy
  • Zebrafish
PubMed
27249162 Full text @ Expert Opin. Drug Discov.
Abstract
Simple animal models have enabled great progress in uncovering the disease mechanisms of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and are helping in the selection of therapeutic compounds through chemical genetic approaches.
Within this article, the authors provide a concise overview of simple model organisms, C. elegans, Drosophila and zebrafish, which have been employed to study ALS and discuss their value to ALS drug discovery. In particular, the authors focus on innovative chemical screens that have established simple organisms as important models for ALS drug discovery.
There are several advantages of using simple animal model organisms to accelerate drug discovery for ALS. It is the authors' particular belief that the amenability of simple animal models to various genetic manipulations, the availability of a wide range of transgenic strains for labelling motoneurons and other cell types, combined with live imaging and chemical screens should allow for new detailed studies elucidating early pathological processes in ALS and subsequent drug and target discovery.
Genes / Markers
Figures
Expression
Phenotype
Mutations / Transgenics
Human Disease / Model
Sequence Targeting Reagents
Fish
Antibodies
Orthology
Engineered Foreign Genes
Mapping