Neurodegenerative diseases that affect the motor neurons, including amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), have little treatment options and are generally rapidly fatal (1, 2). We harnessed the power of unbiased, whole transcriptome differential gene expression analysis, utilizing primary patient cells and tissues to discover genes whose expression defines ALS using published microarray data (3, 4). We found significant differential expression of TRAF5, encoding TNF receptor-associated factor 5,

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... n the skeletal muscle of patients with ALS. TRAF5 was also differentially expressed in primary motor neurons isolated from patients with ALS. TRAF5 transcript was present at significantly higher levels in skeletal muscle from patients with ALS as compared to skeletal muscle from control individuals. These analyses will begin to define the transcriptional landscape of ALS.