As a not-for-profit organization headquartered in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, our mission is to discover new cures from plants. With a state-of-the art laboratory in Jackson, as well as an additional laboratory in Southern California, we have assembled a team of researchers who are working tirelessly to find and fight causes of disease and to search for new cures from plants.
Current projects of the Institute include:
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Our studies of remote Pacific island villages with high levels of ALS led to reconsideration of BMAA—a toxic amino acid—as a possible trigger for certain neurodegenerative illnesses in genetically vulnerable individuals. We and our collaborators have found that BMAA is produced by cyanobacteria which occur throughout the world.
We have developed techniques to detect BMAA at extremely low concentrations in water supplies and human tissues. If BMAA does indeed serve as an environmental trigger for sporadic ALS, our research will help identify those individuals who are vulnerable to the cyanobacterial toxin. We also are exploring new approaches to ALS therapy based on BMAA research.
