GENE TESTING TO FIND A CURE FOR PARKINSON'S

23andMe, the gene-testing company backed by Google Inc., wants to collect DNA from the spit of 10,000 people with Parkinson’s disease to hunt for common genes that may cause the illness or predict patients’ response to drugs.

To entice patients to participate, the Mountain View, California-based company will offer to test them for $25, a fraction of the normal $399 fee. The quest is personal for Ann Wojcicki, who helped start 23andMe in 2006. Her husband, Google co-founder Sergey Brin, has a gene variant that increases his risk of developing the neurological condition, which afflicts his mother.

One million North Americans and more than 4 million people worldwide have Parkinson’s, which causes people to tremble, shake and lose control of their body’s movements. The condition comes in different forms, and its causes are poorly understood, with a handful of genes known to increase the risk. 23andMe hopes to uncover others.

23andMe, a closely held company, is working with two nonprofit research groups, the Parkinson’s Institute in Sunnyvale, California, and the New York-based Michael J. Fox Foundation, which was founded in 2000 by Fox, an actor, who suffers from Parkinson’s.

In addition to genes, environmental factors including chemical exposure and drug use may also play a role in development of the illness. “We want to try and find out if there are other genetic variations that are associated with Parkinson’s or with rapid progression or slow progression,” said Wojcicki, in a telephone interview yesterday. “Also, why some people respond well to therapy, some people don’t, and some develop resistance faster.”

“We’re very frustrated with the pace of research discoveries and we felt one way to accelerate it would be to empower individuals and form communities and self-create a research cohort,” she said. “We also believe we are really democratizing research in a new way.”

Google invested about $3.9 million in 23andMe in 2007. Brin is helping to subsidize the reduced cost for the gene-testing that gets performed for each patient, Wojcicki said. 23andMe wouldn’t disclose the extent of his contribution.