In motor neurons isolated from ALS patients and in the spinal cord of SOD1-ALS mice, a proapoptotic and mitophagy-associated protein BNIP1 (BCL2 interacting protein 1) was found as an ALS risk gene, and the expression level of BNIP1 was lowered compared to controls (Karch et al., 2018). The gene discussed is BNIP1; the disease is amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.