Existing 'Parkinson's in a dish' models can effectively transform stem cells into brain cells, but not quickly enough to study patient-specific cellular pathologies to guide tailored treatment strategies.
The Brigham research team's technology not only enables the transformation from stem cells to brain cells to occur reproducibly within weeks instead of months, but also allows researchers to develop models that reflect the diverse protein misfolding pathologies that can occur in the brain in that timeframe.
"We sought to assess how quickly we could make human brain cells in the lab that give us a window into key processes occurring in the brains of patients with Parkinson's disease and related disorders like multiple system atrophy and Lewy body dementia," said senior author Vikram Khurana.
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