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Tracy Hampton, PhD

JAMA. 2007;298:1506.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

Investigators at Columbia University, in New York City, and Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, in Cold Spring Harbor, NY, have identified a new microRNA that plays a role in the fine-tuning of midbrain dopaminergic neurons and is deficient in brain tissue from patients with Parkinson disease (Kim J et al. Science. doi:10.1126/science.1140481 [published online ahead of print August 31, 2007]).

MicroRNAs—tiny bits of evolutionarily conserved RNA that regulate gene expression during development—have been linked to human diseases, including heart disease, cancer, Alzheimer disease, Tourette syndrome, and now Parkinson disease. The newly identified microRNA, named miR-133b, regulates the maturation and function of neurons within a pathway that the authors suggest plays a role in functions related to dopaminergic neurons, such as locomotion.

An accompanying commentary noted that clinical studies could assess microRNAs' contribution to the pathogenesis of Parkinson disease, but "the role of microRNAs as a potential therapeutic . . . [Full Text of this Article]