Late last week the Allen Institute for Brain Science revealed its Allen Spinal Cord Atlas. The atlas is the world’s first genome-wide map of the mouse spinal cord. This information will give researchers immediate access to a wealth of free online data that can be applied tospinal cord injury treatment.
According to their press release, there is close to one-quarter of a million Americans who have suffered from a spinal cord injury. With this new map, researchers are able to study diseases and disorders in humans as we share 90 percent of the same genes as mice.
When complete, this atlas will contain an estimated 20,000 genes from both youth and adults. For more information, you can read the press release here.