Gene therapy shown to prevent epilepsy in animal study

Reported by Susan Aldridge, PhD, medical journalist

Gene therapy can prevent the development of epilepsy among experimental animals, according to a new study.
Epilepsy is marked by seizures which result from an imbalance of two types of brain chemical. One is glutamate, which makes brain cells 'fire', and the other is GABA, which inhibits this firing. For normal electrical activity in the brain, these two need to be balanced.

Researchers at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia have been doing research into a part of the brain called the dentate gyrus. Here there are cells bearing a receptor protein which, when activated, can block a seizure from the start by stopping excess electrical activity. They also learned that rats with epilepsy had an abnormality in this receptor. Now they have corrected this using gene therapy. Animals thus treated did not go on to develop the condition or, if they did, its onset was delayed. The researchers believe this form of gene therapy could be helpful in preventing the form of epilepsy that sometimes develops after a brain injury.

Source
Journal of Neuroscience 1st November 2006

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