“Every time we identify new genes that are associated with increased risk of developing MS, we achieve two things,” said Dr. John Richert, executive vice president for research and clinical programs at the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. “We understand more about the cause of the disease so that eventually we will be able to prevent MS from even occurring. That’s a long-term outcome. A shorter-term outcome will be the development of new therapies that are directed at this gene or the gene product so that we will have tremendous direct benefit to people with MS overly a relatively shorter period of time.”

Read the news article about the recently discovered involvement of interleukin 7 receptor alpha chain (IL7Ralpha) in multiple sclerosis (MS). The original “Nature Genetics” research article can be found here.