SALON

Thursday, May 31, 2012 6:15 PM UTC

Experiment lets spine-injured rats walk, climb

By

Topics: From the Wires,

NEW YORK (AP) — Many scientists are working on treatments to help people with spinal cord injuries walk. Now there’s a striking new demonstration of how one approach might work: Spinal nerve stimulation helped rats in a Swiss lab overcome paralysis to walk and climb stairs.

That may sound impressive, but similar progress has been made in people, too. The difference this time is the particular technique used.

“It’s a natural extension of exciting work that’s been done by many groups,” said Dr. John McDonald, director of the International Center for Spinal Cord Injury at Kennedy Krieger Institute in Baltimore. He wasn’t involved in the research.

In the new experiment, reported in Friday’s issue of the journal Science, researchers stimulated spinal nerve circuits and used physical training. The stimulation was electrical current from implanted electrodes plus injections of a chemical mix.

To do the training, the rats were placed in a harness so that only their hind legs reached the ground. Then they were placed on a treadmill, which produced only reflexive stepping, and on stationary ground, where they had to choose to make their legs move if they wanted to reach a piece of chocolate.

They took their first voluntary steps about two to three weeks after the training began, the researchers said. The rats still needed the harness later to keep their balance.

The treatment produced an extensive rewiring in the brain and spinal cord, and the lead researcher said that more than 100 rats have regained walking ability to varying degrees.

“This kind of approach will not cure spinal cord injury” but it might someday help some patients recover more ability to move around, said lead researcher Gregoire Courtine. Only human studies will show how much the technique might help, said Courtine, of the University of Zurich and the technical university EPFL in Lausanne, Switzerland.

Last year, other researchers reported that a paralyzed Oregon man was able to stand and move his legs with a surgically implanted electrical stimulator.

McDonald, of the Krieger Institute, said the new paper would spur great interest among spinal cord researchers, in part because the techniques it used could be readily applied to people. The electrical stimulation could be given through the skin rather than from implanted electrodes, he said.

But he and W. Dalton Dietrich, scientific director of the Miami Project to Cure Paralysis at the University of Miami, noted that the rats had been given a spinal injury that differs from what is normally seen in people. So more studies are needed involving injuries more typical of human patients, McDonald said.

___

Online:

Researcher video: http://youtu.be/ejwEqpV8ak4

Journal Science: http://www.science.com

___

Malcolm Ritter can be followed at http://www.twitter.com/malcolmritter

.

More Malcolm Ritter.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • A missing poster hangs on a tree outside the Cleveland home of Amanda Berry Wednesday. Berry and two other women, Michelle Knight and Gina DeJesus, made a daring escape this week after being held captive for more than a decade.
    Credit: AP/Tony Dejak

  • Elvis Rafael Rodriguez and Emir Yasser Yeje offer their best impression of  Eric B. & Rakim. On Thursday, New York prosecutors identified the pair as members of an international gang that robbed $45 million in a matter of hours by hacking into a database of prepaid debit cards and draining ATM machines around the world.
    Credit: AP

  • New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie walks to a podium during the groundbreaking ceremony for the Technology Enhanced Accelerated Learning Center at Essex County Newark Tech in Newark, N.J., Tuesday. Christie made less flattering headlines this week after undergoing a secret stomach surgery to curb his weight.
    Credit: AP/Julio Cortez

  • Workers stand outside the Tung Hai Sweater Ltd. factory in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Thursday after a fire broke out in its 11-story building. Eight people were killed in the blaze.
    Credit: AP/Ismail Ferdous

  • Workers rescue a woman trapped for 17 days in the rubble of a garment factory building in Saver, Bangladesh, Friday. The building's collapse was the worst industrial disaster in the country's history, killing more than 1,000 people.
    Credit: AP

  • Former South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford gives his victory speech Tuesday in Mt. Pleasant, S.C., after winning back his old congressional seat in the state's first district.
    Credit: AP/Rainier Ehrhardt

  • Jodi Arias reacts in Maricopa Country Superior Court Wednesday after being found guilty of first-degree murder in the gruesome killing of her one-time boyfriend, Travis Alexander. Arias has subsequently said she wants the death penalty, claiming she'd "prefer to die sooner than later."
    Credit: AP/The Arizona Republic/Rob Schumacher

  • Ariel Castro stands for his mug shot Thursday at the Cuyahoga County Corrections Center, where he is being held on $8 million bail. The former bus driver is accused of imprisoning three young women and beating them repeatedly over a period of 10 years.
    Credit: AP/Cuyahoga County

  • Charles Ramsey addresses the media Monday after helping rescue three women held captive in Cleveland for more than a decade. Ramsey's hero portraiture has been complicated by revelations of his own domestic violence record.
    Credit: AP/The Plain Dealer/Scott Shaw

  • Michael B. Donley, Secretary of the Air Force, testifies during a Senate Appropriations Defense Subcommittee hearing on Capitol Hill Wednesday. The military branch was rocked this week after its chief sexual assault prevention officer was charged with sexual battery.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments are not enabled for this story.

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: So long, Sookie Stackhouse

Recommendations