“New treatments are desperately needed for progressive MS and this research opens up a promising new avenue,” said Dr. Rashmi Kothary, Senior Scientist, The Ottawa Hospital and Professor, uOttawa.A new study from The Ottawa Hospital and uOttawa shows that a microRNA molecule called miR-145-5p could be key to developing new treatments for progressive multiple sclerosis (MS). 

Unlike the more common relapsing-remitting form of MS, which involves periodic neuroinflammatory attacks followed by repair and recovery, progressive MS gets steadily worse over time with no breaks for the brain to heal. 

Dr. Rashmi Kothary’s team recently published a study in Nature’s Communications Biology showing that miR-145-5p is overabundant in inflammatory lesions in patients with progressive MS, as well as in mouse models of the disease. When miR-145-5p was “knocked out” of the progressive MS mouse model, the animals were better able to repair MS-related damage and symptoms improved. 

“New treatments are desperately needed for progressive MS and this research opens up a promising new avenue,” said Dr. Kothary, Senior Scientist, The Ottawa Hospital and Professor, uOttawa.

Authors: Kornfeld SF, Cummings SE, Yaworski R, De Repentigny Y, Gagnon S, Zandee S, Fathi S, Prat A, Kothary R.

Funders: Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Multiple Sclerosis Society of Canada, Fonds de Recherche en Santé du Québec, University of Ottawa, Canada Research Chairs Program.

Core resources: StemCore, Bioinformatics, Imaging

The Ottawa Hospital is a leading academic health, research and learning hospital proudly affiliated with the University of Ottawa and supported by The Ottawa Hospital Foundation.