Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD) is an X-linked, progressive degenerative muscle disease caused by a variety of mutations that disrupt the open reading frame (ORF) of DMD, encoding dystrophin, a critical component of the dystrophin-associated glycoprotein complex (DGC) necessary for muscle protection and repair. The gene discussed is DMD; the disease is Duchenne muscular dystrophy.