Interestingly, the formation of paraspeckles has been proposed to represent an important neuronal stress response based on several observations including the fact that NEAT1 is upregulated in early stage ALS and in the brains of heroin users (Michelhaugh et al., 2011; Nakagawa and Hirose, 2012; Nishimoto et al., 2013). Here, NEAT1 is linked to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.