Mutations of the FUS gene were first reported to cause amyotrophic lateral 
sclerosis (ALS). Subsequent studies confirmed the role of mutations in ALS and 
also implicated them in frontotemporal dementia (FTD). Recently, through 
Next-Generation Exome sequencing approaches a mutation resulting in a 
substitution (p.Q290X) in the nuclear export domain of the FUS protein was 
nominated as a cause of autosomal dominant essential tremor (ET) in a large 
kindred. In addition, recent reports suggest a possible role for TDP-43 
mutations in parkinsonism; TDP-43 is another RNA-binding protein implicated in 
ALS. Given these findings we investigated the role of FUS variants in 
Parkinson's disease (PD). We sequenced specific regions of the gene encoding 
three functional domains of the FUS protein in 702 patients with PD. Our 
sequencing study did not identify any novel non-synonymous variant that would 
appear to affect the subjects' susceptibility to Parkinson's disease. These 
findings and previous studies have shown that variants within the FUS gene are 
not a common cause of PD or ET, in comparison to their role in ALS.