Saks Fifth Avenue has designated Jacob’s Cure to receive 5% of purchases made with a Saks credit card by our supporters in February 2012.
If you have shopping to do, please go to Saks in Greenwich and choose Jacob’s Cure as the beneficiary of your purchases. You can make your designation at the register when you check out and it will apply to all of your purchases for the entire month of February.
So get out there, shop Saks and support Jacob’s Cure!
If you don’t currently have a Saks credit card, please see any sales associate to open up an account and start shopping to benefit a great cause!
Dr. Reuben Matalon and Dr. Ronald Viola
Jacob’s Cure and the Canavan Research Foundation have recently teamed up to co-fund a new project exploring the application of Enzyme Replacement Therapy for Canavan Disease. The research project is being led by Dr. Reuben Matalon of the University of Texas Medical Branch and Dr. Ronald Viola of the University of Toledo.
Dr. Matalon was responsible for the initial identification of aspartoacylase as the enzyme defect in Canavan disease and the subsequent production of an animal model of this disease that is used to examine the effects of experimental treatments. Dr. Viola has determined the structure of aspartoacylase and elucidated the mechanism by which this enzyme carries out the metabolism of NAA. These researchers have combined their expertise to devise new therapies for the treatment of Canavan disease.
Their objective for this project is to produce modified forms of aspartoacylase that can be used in human enzyme replacement therapy trials for Canavan disease. The rationale for this approach is that replacement of the defective enzyme with a stable, non-immunogenic and active form of aspartoacylase can overcome the genetic defect and potentially prevent further deterioration of brain function. If successful, it is their expectation that administering ERT before the appearance of symptoms may produce a treatment for Canavan disease and, under the most favorable of circumstances, may actually allow reversal of some developmental defects.
