MND affects nerves found in the brain and spinal cord, that instruct your muscle tissue what to do.
This causes them to weaken and stiffen over time and usually affects how you walk, talk, consume food and breathe.
This is a relatively rare disease that is most common in individuals above age fifty, but adults of any age can be affected.
An individual's lifetime risk of developing MND is one in 300.
Approximately five thousand people in the UK will have the disease at any given moment.
Researchers are not sure the cause of MND, but it is likely to be a mix of the genes - or inherited characteristics - you inherit from your parents when you are delivered, and additional environmental influences.
For up to one in 10 individuals with MND, particular genetic factors are far more significant.
There is usually a family history of the illness in these cases.
MND affects everyone differently.
Not everyone has the same symptoms, or encounters them in the same order.
The condition can progress at varying rates too.
Some of the most frequent signs are:
No cure, but there is optimism stemming from treatments focused on different forms of MND.
MND is not one disease - it is really several that culminate in the death of motor neurones.
A new drug called tofersen works in only one in 50 individuals, however it has been demonstrated to slow - and in certain instances even reverse - some of the symptoms of MND.
It has been referred to as "absolutely groundbreaking" and a "significant point of hope" for the whole disease.
Even though the medication has recently received approval in the EU, it is not yet available in the UK.
There is only one drug currently licensed for the management of MND in the UK and endorsed by the NHS.
Riluzole may slow down the advancement of the condition and increase survival by several months, but it does not reverse damage.
Certain individuals can live for many years with MND, such as theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking, who was identified at the age of 22 and lived to 76.
But for the majority, the disease progresses quickly and life expectancy is just a few years.
Based on the charity MND Association, the condition kills a third of individuals within a twelve months and more than half within two years of diagnosis.
As the neurons cease functioning, swallowing and breathing become more challenging and many people need nutritional support or respiratory aids to help them stay alive.
The exact cause has not been identified, but elite athletes seem overrepresented by MND.
A pair of research projects from 2005 and 2009 indicated that soccer players have an increased risk of contracting MND.
Research from 2022 by the Glasgow University involving four hundred former Scotland rugby union players determined they had an higher likelihood of acquiring the condition.
Scientists also found that rugby athletes who have suffered repeated head injuries have physiological variations that may make them more susceptible to developing MND.
The MND Association acknowledges there is a "correlation" between collision sports and MND.
It added that while the sportspeople studied were more likely to acquire MND, it did not show the sports directly led to the condition.
The organization also stresses that "reported MND cases in these studies is remains quite small, and so determining there is a definite increased risk could be misunderstood if this is merely a cluster due to statistical coincidence".
Multiple high-profile sports figures have been diagnosed with the condition in the past few years.
This encompasses ex- rugby union players, soccer players, and cricketers.
In the United States, baseball player Lou Gehrig succumbed to the disease at the age of 39.
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