The University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) Department of Pediatrics is proud to announce that Matthew Alexander, Ph.D., associate professor in the Division of Pediatric Neurology, has been awarded a $149,000 grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to support research focused on a rare neuromuscular disease.
The award, funded by the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences, will support a project aimed at identifying key biomarkers for patients with X-linked myopathy with excessive autophagy (XMEA), a rare genetic muscle disorder that causes progressive weakness beginning in childhood.
“This award will allow us to identify key biomarkers for an upcoming off-label clinical trial that we are pursuing to treat these XMEA patients seen in our MDA clinic by our outstanding staff,” said Alexander
XMEA is an extremely rare condition with no approved disease-modifying treatments. By identifying measurable biological markers, Alexander’s team hopes to better track disease progression and response to therapy, a critical step toward launching future clinical trials and improving patient outcomes.
The research will focus on patients followed through UAB’s Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA) Clinic, a multidisciplinary program that provides comprehensive care for children with neuromuscular conditions across Alabama and the Southeast.
Research reported in this publication was supported by the National Center For Advancing Translational Sciences of the National Institutes of Health under Award Number R03TR005967. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.