Veteran neurons: why some die while others hold out for years in ALS
A long-lived cell is like a house where, instead of turning off the lights to save money, you switch them to emergency lighting: the bulbs dim, but life still glows. In amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), such house-neurons show up in the spinal cord, and scientists have now seen for the first time exactly how they shift into this mode.