Except for that one fight that day among legislators....chuckle.

It will take me awhile to complete this post as I need to put an article in, but will preface with introducing Ken Cater from the Pipeline Project, in the article. He [I suggest we make up a word that describes how we feel about it instead of calling it PD] like - has had Chemical Clown disease for just a couple of years, has his own engineering firm, and two-year old twins. Do you think he might be motivated to put a stop to this right now? Toxic Brain Shock disease; Poison I.V. ; Screwed Up CNS Cells disease ( known as SUCCS disease}; Screwy Lewy (Bodies] disease...

Here's one way they are getting it done. Article coming.

Thursday, June 14, 2007
UA students given $10,000 for research

A $10,000 donation to Parkinson's disease research was not given to doctors or pharmaceutical companies. It was given to three undergraduate students at the Capstone. The Parkinsons Association of Alabama gave the donation to a University research lab led by Guy and Kim Caldwell, professors of biological sciences, so they could hire the student researchers for the summer.
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Meghan Menard
Student Life Editor
Issue date: 6/14/07

A $10,000 donation to Parkinson's disease research was not given to doctors or pharmaceutical companies. It was given to three undergraduate students at the Capstone.

The Parkinsons Association of Alabama gave the donation to a University research lab led by Guy and Kim Caldwell, professors of biological sciences, so they could hire the student researchers for the summer.

Adam Knight, a junior majoring in biology, Max Thompson, a sophomore majoring in biology and Stacey Fox, a junior majoring in biology, psychology and Spanish, were chosen by the Caldwells to conduct the research, said Linda Cole, president of the PAA.

After meeting with the Caldwells, Cole and former PAA president, Phillip Johnson, learned that the Caldwells needed funding to hire more student researchers, she said.

"The more research students they had the more research they could get done," she said.

She said this is the PAA's first direct donation to college research students.

"I think it's a pretty prestigious thing to be a student in the Caldwells' lab," she said. "[The Caldwells] made a pretty significant discovery that may lead to a cure, or at least in helping finding a cure for Parkinson's."

In 2006, the Caldwells and researchers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology discovered a new pathway into the cause of Parkinson's disease.

Guy said after the research findings were published in Science Magazine he was invited to speak at the Parkinson's patient support group meeting.

"I took the opportunity to bring all our team onto the stage in front of the Parkinson's patients - undergrads and grad students," he said. "We had a large group of students up there and I think the patients were moved by the show of young faces wanting to help them."

After the meeting the patients asked how they could support the lab, he said.

"As an organization they support research for M.D.s at UAB, but uncommonly does anyone ever spend money on undergraduates," he said. "I think they were so impressed with the number of students we have involved and the quality of work the students are doing and their dedication," he said.

The students are paid for 40 hours of work a week, he said, but he wouldn't be surprised if the students were at the lab for 60 to 80 hours a week.

"They make the lab their home," he said. "Patients see that as very worthwhile for them to invest in."

Each of the students will work with graduate students on different research projects, Kim said, but each project will relate to drug screening for Parkinson's genes.

The three students will use microscopic C. elegan worms to conduct their research, Guy said.

The worms are see-through and only a millimeter long, about the size of a period mark, he said, and about 70 percent of their DNA is similar to human DNA.

Ken Cater, PAA board member, said C. elegans have a lifespan of 14 days, which makes them easy to study.

Knight said while human brains have numerous dopamine producing neurons, which are the first neurons to die in Parkinson's patients, the worms have only about eight.

"So you can basically kill [the worm] and see what happens," he said.

With five incubators filled with Petri dishes, each containing about a thousand worms feeding of the bacteria E. coli, the students and the Caldwells call the lab the Worm Shack.

The students will work to identify molecules that affect the genes that have been linked to Parkinson's disease, Guy said.

"Hopefully they will find pathways into ways those molecules may be functioning," he said.

The Michael J. Fox Foundation as well as pharmaceutical companies interested in developing drugs that the students discover fund the lab, he said.

Crater said he hopes over the summer the Caldwells and the students will discover hits for potential drug development.

"There's a lot of things that [a discovered drug] could do," he said. "It could slow the progression [of Parkinson's] which is what we desperately need. It could potentially cure the disease and it also has the ability to treat the symptoms."

Fox said Parkinson's is a complex disease.

"A lot is known about it but we're trying to tie up all the ends," she said. "We don't even really know what causes it. We know some people are more prone to it and that doing certain things makes you more likely to get it."

She said working in the lab during the summer is fun.

"You get a lot more work done because you don't have classes," she said. "You can work at your own schedule instead of trying to fit everything in."

Thompson said the big deal about the donation is that it comes from Parkinson's patients and their families.

"That's real special because you could get a grant from some institute somewhere but this comes from the patients," he said. "They believe in us and they want us to do the work that could possibly help them."

Knight said he and the other students could come to a better understanding of the disease.

"They can treat the symptoms, but they can't treat the disease," he said. "Maybe we could find a cure."