Skeletal Muscle Dysfunction Research

Powerful genomic research tools used to understand cancer and heart disease might also help us understand why people with ME/CFS develop post-exertional malaise (PEM). The way that genes in ME/CFS patients behave differently from those in healthy comparable subjects might give tremendous insight for a biomarker or drug targets to combat PEM and fatigue.

The hypothesis is that the inflammation-related recovery mechanisms become dysfunctional in the ME/CFS disease, and this dysregulation causes delayed muscle recovery after exertional stress.

This hypothesis will be tested by analysing nearly 100 muscle biopsy samples from healthy subjects whose ages, sex, and lifestyles match those of ME/CFS patients as closely as possible. Careful comparison to these samples will be critical to detect subtle differences in the genes responsible for a healthy recovery from muscular exercise.