Drugs That Promote Remyelination Could Help Treat Multiple Sclerosis

Material below is adapted from the SfN Short Course Drug-Based Modulation of Endogenous Stem Cells Promotes Functional Remyelination In Vivo, by Fadi Najm, et al. Short Courses are daylong scientific trainings on emerging neuroscience topics and research techniques held the day before SfN’s annual meeting.

Working like the insulation coating electrical wires, myelin — the fatty substance sheathing the thin fiber projecting from the neuronal cell body — protects those axons and supports efficient nerve transmission.

Multiple sclerosis (MS) arises when the immune system attacks myelin causing communication problems between the brain and the rest of the body. MS is characterized by both damage to the myelin sheath (demyelination) and a failure to repair the damaged myelin (remyelination). Without the protective myelin coating, messages traveling along nerve fibers may be slowed or stopped, and, over time, the axons and cell bodies of neurons can also become damaged.