A scientific paper about BPAN recently published in the journal Autophagy has created some confusion within the community of BPAN families, friends, and caregivers. Entitled “WDR45, one gene associated with multiple developmental disorders,” the paper suggests that gene mutations in WDR45 lead to six separate disorders rather than just BPAN. As you can imagine, this […]

Dr. Sibon’s group in the Netherlands has published a paper that reveals important insights into the biochemical changes in PKAN and related disorders (CoPAN, MePAN and PDH-E2 deficiency). It reports work done largely by Roald Lambrechts (who just got his PhD yesterday!) and others in the Sibon lab. Dr. Sibon has also written a FAQs […]

This peer-reviewed paper authored by our OHSU team in partnership with our Dutch colleagues helps explain the rationale behind our proposed CoA-Z trial in humans. In addition to a link to the paper below, we also developed some Frequently Asked Questions that summarize key points and their relevance for PKAN families. The paper is now […]

A recent scientific paper (linked below) reports that PLAN is associated with ceramide accumulation in a fruit fly model of this disorder. Ceramide is a type of fat (lipid) used widely in the body, especially in the membranes of cells. The authors report that accumulation of ceramide in the nervous system puts stress on an […]

Approximately two years ago, our team worked with researchers in Israel and several other countries to discover a new disease-causing gene called MECR. Mutations in this gene cause a condition that we named MEPAN, which stands for “mitochondrial enoyl CoA reductase protein-associated neurodegeneration.” Although MEPAN does not cause brain iron accumulation, both the symptoms and […]

This article and other news can be found in the latest issue of our newsletter which can be downloaded/viewed here: August 2018. In 2014 the Hayflick lab started a project with the University of Washington to sequence DNA for our patients who did not yet have a genetic diagnosis. These 54 subjects had symptoms similar […]

This article and other news can be found in the latest issue of our newsletter which can be downloaded/viewed here: June 2018. No one can say exactly how many people in the world have a NBIA disorder, but we can guess based on how many people have been diagnosed so far. Today, PKAN is the […]

This article and other news can be found in the latest issue of our newsletter which can be downloaded/viewed here: April 2018. Back in April 2015, the very first beta-testers started participating in our online natural history study, PKANready. These early testers helped us work out the bugs and finalize the design before the full […]

Our team will now be publishing a newsletter several times a year to update you on our research studies and let you know about upcoming projects. If you would like to join the mailing list to receive the pdf by email as soon as it’s released, please let us know by sending an email to […]

As promised, here are updates on the fundraising questions you had about CoA-Z, the possible treatment of PKAN that we are developing. Our goal is to make CoA-Z available to everyone at the lowest cost possible so we have formed sister non-profit foundations in the Netherlands and US to further develop the compound. The link […]