title: Ventral approach to the lumbar spine of the Sprague-Dawley rat.
abstract: Lumbar intervertebral disc repair is an important tissue-engineering research area. In creating an in vivo rat model to evaluate repair techniques, the authors developed a surgical transperitoneal approach that permits the easy exposure of four lumbar vertebral bodies with no surgery-related peri- or postoperative complications.
authors.affiliation: Orthopaedic Bioengineering Lab, University of California-San Francisco, San Francisco, CA, USA.
authors.forename: Marc-Antoine
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Rousseau
authors.forename: Elisa C
authors.initials: EC
authors.lastname: Bass
authors.forename: Jeffrey C
authors.initials: JC
authors.lastname: Lotz
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D007403:Intervertebral Disc / Q000601:surgery*; D008159:Lumbar Vertebrae / Q000033:anatomy & histology / Q000601:surgery*; D008297:Male; D011182:Postoperative Care / Q000379:methods; D051381:Rats / Q000033:anatomy & histology / Q000601:surgery*; D017207:Rats, Sprague-Dawley; D013514:Surgical Procedures, Operative / Q000379:methods