Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis: a role for enteroviruses?

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is the most frequent motor neuron disea se. Although it is a clinically well defined disease, its etiology remains unknown. Among, various hypotheses, the putative rob of enteroviruses has b een recently suggested by the detection of enteroviral sequences in neurons of spinal cord samples from ALS patients. However, there is a lack of cons ensus on the role of EV in ALS, in the present paper, we summerized the pat hogenic role of these viruses, analyzed the discrepancy between different s tudies and speculated on the possible role of enteroviruses in ALS.