How Van Andel researcher made Parkinson's breakthrough with help from Michael J. Fox, Rockford coach, Japanese trout

GRAND RAPIDS, MI Myriad factors fell into place to bring about Van Andel Institute's recent breakthrough in Parkinson's disease research.

A Rockford basketball coach and Hollywood star Michael J. Fox. Patients at Saint Marys Health Care and patients in Sweden. Rainbow trout in Japan. And a Malaysian scientist.

That international constellation of people and places and fish are the touch points in a study that may lead to a better way to detect Parkinsons disease. Connecting the dots was a Van Andel Institute scientist named Sok Kean Khoo, who scanned and analyzed blood samples in a bright, glass-roofed lab overlooking downtown Grand Rapids.

From Malaysia to Michigan

Khoo, who is of Chinese descent and grew up in Malaysia, has worked at VAI for 13 years. Although she was initially involved in cancer research, she noticed Parkinsons patients blood samples stored in a freezer at the institute. She wondered if she could apply a cancer research technique, looking for tiny molecules called microRNA, to investigate a neurodegenerative disease.

Her pilot project, published in December in the Journal of Parkinsons Disease, was the first to identify a molecular biomarker in blood plasma that may one day be used to develop a blood test for Parkinsons.

Ultimately, Khoo hopes the research will lead to treatments targeting genes that cause the disease, preventing its steady degeneration of the central nervous system.

But one step at a time, she said. My closest goal is to find a diagnostic test.

A diagnostic test to determine the status of a patients disease onset would provide crucial data for more timely, efficient and successful therapeutic interventions, said Dr. Patrik Brundin, the director of VAIs Center for Neurodegenerative Science. Dr. Khoos interesting study is an important step in that direction.

Related: For VAI's lead Parkinson's researcher, fight against disease is personal Scientist hopes study will lead to way to halt Parkinson's Michael J. Fox Foundation awards $400,000 to Grand Rapids researchers

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How Van Andel researcher made Parkinson's breakthrough with help from Michael J. Fox, Rockford coach, Japanese trout