eLife's breakthrough discovery of protein needed for muscle regeneration

A researcher from the School of Pharmacy at the University of Houston discovered the protein needed for effective regeneration of skeletal muscles after acute injury and Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) patients

Skeletal muscle connects your bones and makes you exercise.

Therefore, when skeletal muscle is injured due to trauma or degenerative disease, it becomes complicated

Kumar reports: "We found that IRE1 and XBP1 proteins located on the membrane of the endoplasmic reticulum (organelles involved in protein production, folding and quality control) are important for the efficient regeneration of skeletal muscle and DMD after injury

Understanding the mechanism of skeletal muscle regeneration is essential for the development of new therapies for the treatment of various inherited and acquired degenerative muscle diseases

"We found that in models that specifically remove IRE1 or XBP1 proteins in skeletal muscle, skeletal muscle repair is significantly weakened

The Kumar laboratory is investigating whether the recently developed highly specific drug activators IRE1 and XBP1 can improve skeletal muscle regeneration after acute injury and other muscle degenerative diseases

Kumar said: "This research work provides a huge space for the development of drugs for skeletal muscle diseases

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