The man who discovered DNA, Frederick Miescher, was a young physician who worked in the laboratory of physiological chemistry of eminent scientist Felix Hoppe-Seyler. At the time of the discovery he was 25 years old and had not long graduated from his studies.
A little over 5,600 people in the U.S. are diagnosed with ALS each year. (That's a new victim every 90 minutes.) It is estimated that as many as 30,000 Americans have the disease at any given time. 80% of the people with ALS are men and 93% of patients are Caucasian. Most people who develop ALS are between the ages of 40 and 70, with an average age of 55 at the time of diagnosis. However, cases of the disease do occur in persons in their twenties and thirties.
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), commonly called Lou Gehrig's disease, is a progressive neuromuscular condition characterized by weakness, muscle wasting, fasciculations and increased reflexes.Approximately 30,000 Americans currently have the disease. The annual incidence rate is one to two cases per 100,000. It is frequently referred to as âLou Gehrig's diseaseâ in memory of the famous baseball player who died of ALS in 1941. 2 ALS is defined as adult-onset, idiopathic, progressive degeneration of anterior horn cells and upper and lower motor neurons resulting in progressive muscle weakness, wasting and fasciculations.