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Student Races ALS in Penn Lab
10 Mar
Summary
- Student Yentli Soto Albrecht fights rare genetic ALS.
- She hopes gene therapy research will save her life.
- Her father died of the same ALS form in 2024.
A medical student at the University of Pennsylvania is engaged in critical research in a bid to combat ALS, a fatal neurodegenerative disease. Yentli Soto Albrecht, an MD/PhD student at the Perelman School of Medicine, is personally invested in this fight, as she has a rare genetic form of the illness.
Albrecht, 32, discovered she has the same form of ALS that led to her father's death in 2024. This diagnosis was particularly devastating as she witnessed his decline and linked it to FTD, a form of dementia. Her father was in a wheelchair by the time of her wedding.
Currently, there are no cures for ALS, with limited treatment options available. Albrecht's hope rests on the research being conducted at Penn, specifically focusing on developing a gene therapy. Dr. Defne Amado, an ALS researcher who also treated Albrecht's father, is collaborating with her on this mission.
Together, Amado and Soto Albrecht are driven by the shared determination to significantly impact ALS and FTD, aiming to transform them from fatal diagnoses into survivable conditions. Their work in the lab is a race against time, with the future hope of life-saving treatments.
