2023-09-25 14:50:04
Scientists have developed a gene therapy that in mice has regrew nerve connections through an area damaged by a spinal cord injury and guided the nerves to reconnect to the correct specific points, making animals that They were paralyzed to regain mobility.
The achievement is the work of a team led by Jordan W. Squair, from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL).
When the spinal cords of mice and humans are only partially damaged, initial paralysis is followed by a spontaneous recovery of motor function. However, after a complete spinal cord injury, this natural repair of the spinal cord does not occur and there is no recovery.
Significant recovery after severe spinal cord injuries requires strategies that promote nerve fiber regeneration, but the conditions necessary for these strategies to successfully restore motor function have been elusive.
“Five years ago, we showed that nerve fibers can regenerate through the space damaged by complete anatomical lesions of the spinal cord,” explains Mark Anderson, from EPFL and co-author of the new study. “But we also realized that this was not enough to restore motor function, as the new fibers failed to connect to the appropriate points on the other side of the injury.”
Working in collaboration with colleagues at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and Harvard Medical School, both institutions in the United States, EPFL scientists used state-of-the-art equipment to perform in-depth analyzes and identify what type of neuron intervenes in the natural repair of the spinal cord after a partial spinal cord injury.
The results of the analyzes not only revealed the specific axons that must be regenerated, but also the target points to which these axons must reconnect to restore motor function.
These revealing new data allowed researchers to design a new gene therapy. In this, the scientists activated growth programs in the neurons identified in mice to regenerate their nerve fibers, modified the regulation of specific proteins to promote the growth of neurons through the nucleus of the lesion and administered guide molecules to attract the nerve fibers. regenerating towards their natural targets on the other side of the injury.
A moment of the regeneration process. (Image: EPFL / Neurorestore. CC BY-SA)
As a result of the application of the new therapy, mice with complete anatomical lesions of the spinal cord that were paralyzed recovered the ability to walk, showing gait patterns that resembled those observed in mice that returned to walking naturally after partial lesions. .
The study is titled “Recovery of walking after paralysis by regenerating characterized neurons to their natural target region.” And it has been published in the academic journal Science. (Source: NCYT from Amazings)
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