{"id":218754,"date":"2025-07-26T00:11:42","date_gmt":"2025-07-26T05:11:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/07\/research-brings-hope-for-new-treatments-for-spinal-muscular-atrophy-autism"},"modified":"2025-07-26T00:11:42","modified_gmt":"2025-07-26T05:11:42","slug":"research-brings-hope-for-new-treatments-for-spinal-muscular-atrophy-autism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/07\/research-brings-hope-for-new-treatments-for-spinal-muscular-atrophy-autism","title":{"rendered":"Research brings hope for new treatments for spinal muscular atrophy, autism"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/research-brings-hope-for-new-treatments-for-spinal-muscular-atrophy-autism.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Ancient bacteria that have evolved to become integral to our cells\u2014converting nutrients from food into energy\u2014may also contribute to neurologic disorders, such as spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) and autism, according to research in the lab of Yongchao Ma, Ph.D., from Ann &amp; Robert H. Lurie Children\u2019s Hospital of Chicago.<\/p>\n<p>Called mitochondria, these mysterious parts of the cell have even retained their own DNA. Traditionally they are known as the \u201cpowerhouse of the cell.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In recent years, however, mitochondria have been recognized as regulating many functions, including <a href=\"https:\/\/medicalxpress.com\/tags\/gene+expression\/\" rel=\"tag\" class=\"\">gene expression<\/a> and how cells communicate. Dr. Ma\u2019s research focuses on how dysregulation by mitochondria may lead to motor neuron degeneration in SMA or improper neuron connections in <a href=\"https:\/\/medicalxpress.com\/tags\/autism\/\" rel=\"tag\" class=\"\">autism<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ancient bacteria that have evolved to become integral to our cells\u2014converting nutrients from food into energy\u2014may also contribute to neurologic disorders, such as spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) and autism, according to research in the lab of Yongchao Ma, Ph.D., from Ann &amp; Robert H. Lurie Children\u2019s Hospital of Chicago. Called mitochondria, these mysterious parts of [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":662,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,1506,47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-218754","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biotech-medical","category-food","category-neuroscience"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218754","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/662"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=218754"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218754\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=218754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=218754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=218754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}