Richard A SmithDr. Smith is the Director at the Center for Neurologic Study in La Jolla. During his neurology residency at Stanford University, Dr. Smith began his first studies of Lou Gehrig's Disease which has remained his principal career interest. His initial sudies focused on the symptomatic treatment of ALS but at Scripp's Research Institute, he began to research the cause of ALS and subsequently directed his major effort to developing a therapy for ALS and kindred disorders. His earliest publications in the New England Journal, British Medical Journal, etc. were among the first to demonstrate the utility of symptomatic management in the care of ALS patients. Dr. Smith was one of the first investigators to recognize the potential of interferon as a treatment modality for neurologic disorders, and his work on the pharmacology of interferon contributed to the adoption of interferon as a treatment for multiple sclerosis. Along with colleagues Barry Festoff and Schlomo Melmed, Dr. Smith conducted the first trial of a growth factor (IGF-1) as a potential treatment for neurological disorders. More recent achievements include the development of DMQ which was approved by FDA in 2011 for the treatment of emotional lability associated with ALS and kindred diseases. Last July, in a nationwide controlled study, he and his colleagues demonstrated enhancement of speech and swallowing in ALS. This medical milestone is unique in that no pharmacologic intervention had ever improved function in this disorder. Perhaps his most notable achievement is his realization that it would be possible to downregulate the expression of gene products in the central nervous system using antisense therapeutics. This work was undertaken with Don Cleveland (UCSD) and Ionis Pharmaceutical Corp. Last year, the FDA approved Spinraza, an antisense product for the treatment of spinal muscular atrophy (SMA1), and in the last few months, Roche Pharmaceuticals announced that their Phase 1/2 treatment trial of Huntington's disease was a success. The endpoint for this study was the reduction of Huntington protein in the spinal fluid. Based on this result and preclinical work in animals, there is reason to believe that this treatment strategy will result in the first meaningful therapy for Huntington's. Read More Read Less