[by:www.21voa.com]
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[00:00.08]This is What's Trending Today:
[00:03.20]Do you remember the Ice Bucket Challenge in 2014?
[00:08.04]Just in case you do not, here is a little history.
[00:12.76]Two years ago, some people dared friends to pour a bucket
[00:17.52]filled with ice water over their heads.
[00:20.72]If the friends refused, they were required to donate money
[00:25.68]to help finance research into a brain disease.
[00:30.04]Most of them took the cold water and donated money, too.
[00:34.76]Many people recorded themselves getting covered with freezing water.
[00:41.52]They posted the videos on social media websites, such as YouTube.
[00:46.76]Then they dared others to pass the challenge.
[00:51.36]As the campaign grew in popularity,
[00:54.40]sports stars, politicians and media celebrities got involved.
[01:00.52]Lots of other people did, too.
[01:03.48]Eventually, the campaign raised over $100 million
[01:08.56]for an organization called the ALS Association.
[01:13.60]ALS is short for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.
[01:19.00]Doctors first recognized the brain disease in the 1800s.
[01:25.24]ALS became known across the United States in 1939
[01:30.44]when baseball star Lou Gehrig
[01:33.12]retired from the New York Yankees because of the condition.
[01:37.48]ALS affects nerve cells in the brain and the spinal cord.
[01:43.32]Eventually, patients cannot control their muscles.
[01:47.60]They become paralyzed.
[01:49.72]Most patients will die within five years after they develop the disease.
[01:56.20]Earlier this week, the ALS Association announced
[02:00.68]that money raised by the Ice Bucket Challenge financed a discovery.
[02:05.80]Researchers working on a project called MinE announced
[02:11.60]they identified a gene that is partly responsible for the disease.
[02:17.12]The gene is called NEK1.
[02:21.28]The study involved researchers from 11 countries.
[02:26.44]They looked at the NEK1 gene and found that it was present
[02:32.36]in ALS patients whose parents also suffered from the disease.
[02:37.64]One of the doctors involved said "the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge
[02:43.16]enabled us to secure funding from new sources in new parts of the world."
[02:48.96]And that's What's Trending Today.
[02:51.23]I'm Mehrnoush Karimian-Ainsworth.