The MURDOCK Study Community Registry and Biorepository Multiple Sclerosis Cohort

Despite tremendous research efforts, the targets of immune response and the mechanisms for neuronal loss associated with MS have not been fully characterized. Although substantial advances have been made in the development of therapeutic treatments, the drugs currently available to MS patients do not significantly alter the long-term prognosis of the disease. Better markers that represent the biological activity of the disease process and response to therapy are desperately needed. MS is thought to be mediated by autoimmunity which causes demyelination and transection of axons throughout the brain and spinal cord resulting in the formation of multiple scars (or scleroses) on axon myelin sheaths and reducing electrical conductivity and decreased CNS signaling. It is most common in young adults; more than 90% of patients are diagnosed before the age of 55 and less than 5% before the age of 14. Females are 2-3 times more frequently affected than males and children of affected females are at a significantly higher risk of developing MS than children of affected males. A strong genetic component is suggested by the co-occurrence of cases within families and the high disease prevalence in some ethnic populations (particularly those of northern European origin) compared with others (African and Asian groups) irrespective of geographic location.7 The incidence of MS in northern Europe, where the genetically associated haplotype HLA DR2 is most common, is as high as 1 per 750 individuals. MS affects more than 400,000 people in the U.S. and 2.5 million worldwide.

Although numerous putative MS-specific biomarkers, representing different mechanisms of pathogenesis and steps along the inflammatory cascade have been proposed, none have been fully validated. To date, the majority of studies identifying biomarkers associated with MS initiation or progression have been limited to investigation of one to several markers at a time; only one study has attempted open platform proteomic profiling in MS; however, the study size was relatively small and the clinical homogeneity of the dataset of the study is not clear. To understand a complex disease like MS, high throughput technologies capable of profiling multiple etiological changes is needed as well as a well-define population of those with the disease.