December 10, 2018

HudsonAlpha Scientists Identify “Poisonous” Piece of Genetic Code Causing Infant Seizures

Featuring the Work of CURE Grantee Gemma L. Carvill, PhD

Researchers at the HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology have pinpointed a previously unknown cause of a serious seizure disorder most common in babies, potentially opening the door to new diagnostic and treatment options for infants that show signs of epilepsy.

They found the genetic cause hidden in the SCN1A gene, one of the most heavily studied genes for seizure disorders. The discovery offers an end to the diagnostic odyssey for affected patients, but it also reveals a genetic mechanism for disease that could uncover the cause of other genetic disorders that are not currently well understood.

Scientists in Greg Cooper’s Lab at HudsonAlpha, along with collaborators from across the country, published their findings in the American Journal of Human Genetics. They identified a variant that cues a poisonous piece of genetic code, called a poison exon, to be included in the final instructions for making a crucial protein. When the poison exon is incorporated, it prematurely cancels the protein’s production, which disrupts neural function leading to seizure disorders.

The lab found the mutation on the SCN1A gene after performing whole genome sequencing for a patient that showed symptoms of a disease called Dravet Syndrome, a serious seizure disorder that most commonly appears in infants. This particular variant would not show up on any of the more common genetic tests and it was only identified because the entire genome was sequenced.

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