We next hypothesized that the DNA damage response abnormally induces the autophagy pathway in ALS-hMSCs through AMPK phosphorylation signaling, which inhibits the negative regulator of autophagy mTOR and activates the autophagosome (omegasome) formation factor ULK1 (Kim et al., 2011). This evidence concerns the gene ULK1 and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.