Abstract

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is an autoimmune demyelinating disease and a common cause of neurological disability in young adults. The modest heritability of MS reflects complex genetic effects and multifaceted gene–environment interactions. The human leukocyte antigen (HLA) region is the strongest susceptibility locus for MS, but a genome-wide association study recently identified new susceptibility genes. Progress in high-throughput genotyping and sequencing technologies and a better understanding of the structural organization of the human genome, together with powerful brain-imaging techniques that refine the phenotype, suggest that the tools could finally exist to identify the full set of genes influencing the pathogenesis of MS.

Author affiliations

1. Department of Neurology, School of Medicine, University of California at San Francisco, 513 Parnassus Avenue, San Francisco, California 94143–0435, USA.
2. Department of Clinical Neuroscience, University of Cambridge, Addenbrooke's Hospital, Hills Road, Cambridge CB2 2QQ, UK.

Correspondence to: Jorge R. Oksenberg¹ Email: jorge.oksenberg@ucsf.edu

Correspondence to: Stephen L. Hauser¹ Email: hausers@neurology.ucsf.edu

Published online 10 June 2008

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