New hope for treating paralysis after spinal cord injury

Dr. Anand R
Senior Scientific Officer, KSTA

A research team from University of California, Federal Institute of Technology, Swiss and Harvard University have successfully restored the functional activity after spinal cord injury. The research team published their findings in Science journal in September 21, 2023.

The same team had suggested a treatment method to trigger the axons, the tiny fibers that link nerve cells, to regrow after spinal cord injury in rodents and demonstrated that nerve fibers can be regenerated after spinal cord injuries in their publication in Nature journal in 2018.

When the spinal cords of mice and humans are partially damaged, the initial paralysis is followed by the extensive, spontaneous recovery of motor function. However, after a complete spinal cord injury, this natural repair of the spinal cord doesn’t occur and there is no recovery. Meaningful recovery after severe injuries requires strategies that promote the regeneration of nerve fibers. Their observations using single-cell nuclear RNA sequencing not only exposed the specific axons that must regenerate, but also revealed that these axons must reconnect to their natural targets to restore motor function.

The team, in their new study published in Science, first used advanced genetic analysis to identify nerve cell groups that enable walking improvement after a partial spinal cord injury. Then used chemical signals to attract and guide the regeneration of these axons to their natural target region in the lumbar spinal cord. Mice with anatomically complete spinal cord injuries regained the ability to walk, exhibiting gait patterns that resembled those quantified in mice that resumed walking naturally after partial injuries. This observation revealed a previously unknown condition for regenerative therapies to be successful in restoring motor function after neurotrauma.

The research team opinioned that the study will unlock the framework to achieve meaningful repair of the injured spinal cord and may expedite repair after other forms of central nervous system injury and disease. The research team  hope that the understanding and re-establishing the projections of specific neuronal subpopulations to their natural target regions holds significant promise for the development of therapies aimed at restoring neurological functions in larger animals and humans.

Reference: Jordan W. Squair et al, Recovery of walking after paralysis by regenerating characterized neurons to their natural target region, Science (2023).