所有神经退行性疾病都有两个共同点：1）它们会杀死脑细胞；2）它们与体内原本正常蛋白质转变为异常形式有关。长期困扰该领域的一个问题是，究竟是什么导致了神经退行性变？这些疾病在走向最终结局的过程中是否存在共同的通路？为回答这些问题，我们看到越来越多的研究跨越多种神经退行性疾病，尽管相关发现最初是在某一种疾病中取得的，但这些研究很可能会对所有疾病都有所助益。
All neurodegenerative diseases have two things in common: 1) they kill brain cells, and 2) they are associated with abnormal forms of what used be normal proteins in our body. One question that has plagued the field is what actually causes neurodegeneration? Is there a common pathway that these diseases follow to their end result? In answer to these questions, we are seeing more and more research that spans across neurodegenerative diseases that will likely aid all of them despite findings initially being discovered in one disease.