Biotech start-up targets Parkinson’s and ALS with new gene therapy

A Cambridge biotechnology company launching Wednesday is taking aim at Parkinson’s disease and ALS with a new gene therapy that deliberately infects patients with a virus.

The firm, Voyager Therapeutics, plans to use a class of viruses known as adeno-associated viruses as carriers to deliver vital proteins to the brain. Intentional infection may be counterintuitive, but the viruses used in the therapy are harmless to humans, making them ideal vehicles for moving proteins throughout the body, without troublesome side effects.

Boston venture capital firm Third Rock Ventures considered Voyager’s research so promising that it invested $45 million to get the company off the ground, an unusually big bet on such an early stage life sciences firm.

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Read the full, original article: Biotech start-up Voyager Therapeutics uses new gene therapy to attack diseases