New research indicates faults in repairing DNA breaks that are caused by oxidative stress in the noncoding parts of the genome are directly involved in the development of neurological diseases. The discovery of the significance of problems in repairing single-strand breaks in ‘junk’ DNA opens up a new area of biology that will lead on to new drug targets, according to Sherif El-Khamisy, professor of molecular medicine and deputy director of the Health Lifespan Institute at the University of Sheffield, U.K., who is co-author of a Sept. 29, 2022, paper in Nature describing the discovery of a gene that sits at the heart of the repair process.