Marisa Cressatti, a PhD student in Neuroscience at McGill University, is the award winner of the Relève étoile Jacques-Genest award of the Fonds de recherche du Québec – Santé (FRQS).
Her award-winning publication: Salivary microR-153 and microR-223 Levels as Potential Diagnostic Biomarkers of Idiopathic Parkinson’s Disease is published in Movement Disorders.
In this study, Marisa Cressatti identifies two new micro-RNAs as promising biomarkers of Parkinson’s disease. A definite diagnosis of early-stage Parkinson’s disease occurs in only 26% of cases. The researcher tested the saliva of 83 Parkinson’s patients and 77 healthy individuals. Saliva has a number of advantages over other biofluids and imaging techniques since taking the sample is non-invasive and inexpensive and requires only minimal staff training. It was found that salivary microR-153 and microR-223 levels were significantly lower in patients diagnosed with early-stage Parkinson’s disease than in the individuals in the healthy group. These promising results will support upcoming large-scale clinical tests in response to a key clinical imperative.
Read the full abstract here.
The Relève étoile award (new name for the Étudiants-chercheurs étoiles award) is awarded to student-researchers by each of the three Fonds de recherche du Québec.
The FRQS Relève étoile award is now named after Jacques Genest as a tribute to this great researcher and builder.
To learn more about the award, click here.
July 29 2020