Research Paper on:
Myelin Regeneration and MS

Unformatted Sample Text from the Research Paper:
Compston and Coles, 2002). In recent years, there has been an increase of identified multiple sclerosis patients with about 50 percent more women reporting the disease (Apatoff, 2002). The increasing  prevalence may well be linked to more knowledge and awareness among both lay people and medical people. Nonetheless between two and three times as many women have MS (National Multiple  Sclerosis Society, 2003). Most patients are diagnosed between the ages of 20 and 50 but there have been numerous cases diagnosed at both younger and older years (National Multiple Sclerosis  Society, 2003). This is a disease that is not at all evenly distributed among geographic region or any demographics (Apatoff, 2002; Midgard, 2001). There is some evidence that worldwide distribution  of MS may be linked to latitude (Midgard, 2001). In the U.S., for instance, there is a lower rate of MS in the South than in other regions (Apatoff, 2002).  Data regarding race shows 54 percent of MS patients are white, 25 percent are black and 19 percent are classified as other (Apatoff, 2002). Multiple sclerosis is not contagious nor  is it directly hereditary but there is some speculation that the patient carries a gene that is prone to develop this disease. The cause(s) of multiple sclerosis remain a  mystery although experts now say that there is some sort of interplay between the environment and genes (National Multiple Sclerosis Society, 2003; Compston and Coles, 2002). Commenting on causes, Murray  stated: "a current popular overarching theory postulates a genetically predisposed individual who develops a viral infection that disrupts the vascular relations in the blood-brain barrier and initiates an immune reaction  that continues as a waxing and waning destructive process that damages myelin, and perhaps more importantly in the long term, the axons" (Murray, 2002, p. 1128). Multiple sclerosis is an