ABSTRACT
A number of clinically distinct disorders of muscle manifest abnormalities in other organs, most often the brain. The most common of these, Duchenne muscular dystrophy, is discussed in a separate chapter. The disorders that predominantly affect muscle, but manifest with distinctive abnormalities of brain as well, likely do so because of widespread gene expression and other commonalities of brain and muscle. Other than their shared tissue vulnerabilities, there is a wide range of apparent gene function between these disorders. This is a rapidly expanding area of clinical and fundamental neuroscience, and more disorders and a better understanding of those disorders already described is virtually certain in the next few years.
