Path To Possible Treatment For M.S. Identified

Scientists have identified in mouse models a "previously unknown kind of immune cell makes a protein that may be a pivotal player in multiple sclerosis."  The protein is called GM-CSF. 

This suggests that it might be possible to cure (or at least effectively treat) MS with a therapy based on neutralizing the GM-CSF protein.   These therapies were effective in the mouse model. 

M.S. is a degenerative auto-immune disease which is probably not genetic and usually strikes in the prime of life, but whose causes are not known.  It leads to decline in nerve function and mental health generally resulting in premature death, and while there are some drugs used to treat it, the treatments only partially control M.S. rather than definitively shutting it down the way an antibiotic, for example, does.