• An international team of researchers led by neuroscientist Owen Ross at Mayo Clinic in Florida found a genetic variation they say protects against Parkinson’s disease. The study, published in the online Aug. 31 issue of Lancet Neurology, also reports the discovery of different variants of the same gene that double Parkinson’s risk in Caucasians and Asians. “The idea that Parkinson’s disease occurs mostly in a random sporadic fashion is changing,” says Ross at the clinic, in Jacksonville’s Southside.
