Is Rett Syndrome the Rosetta Stone of Neurologic Diseases?
Rett Syndrome (RS), a neurological orphan disease of children that was long relegated to obscure articles and the fervent concern of parents, might soon be adopted into a family of higher-profile neurologic disorders. This change from medical oddity to the focus of avid researchers reflects the exciting discovery of genetic similarities between RS and disorders as disparate as autism and Alzheimer disease. And if this early promise holds true, RS will no longer be a medical trivia question. Rather, it could become a medical Rosetta Stone for translating a tangle of genetic and biochemical evidence into a real understanding of some terrible neurological conditions. That ancient slab of writing, found in the Nile delta area in 1799, was inscribed in multiple languages — Egyptian hieroglyphics, a simpler form of Egyptian writing, and Greek. By comparing how the same messages were written in these different languages, a French scholar was able to decode the language of hieroglyphics by 182
