Bridge over troubled waters.
Spinal cord injury interrupts connections between the brain and spinal cord, rather than producing large-scale damage. Reconnecting severed axons with their prior targets is a primary objective of spinal cord repair. Despite progress, this goal will probably not be attained soon because many problems remain to be solved. We discuss an alternative for promoting motor function after spinal damage by bridging the injury. We highlight a novel spinal injury bridge that we have developed to reconnect spinal motor circuits below the injury with the brain. A spinal nerve that exits above the injury is disconnected and inserted into the cord caudal to injury. Motor axons in the inserted nerve regenerate into the cord and synapse on neurons producing a novel circuit to bypass the injury.
Campos
Lucas
L
Center for Neurobiology and Behavior Columbia University, 1051 Riverside Drive, New York, NY 10032 3NYS Psychiatric Institute, New York, NY 10032, USA.
Ambron
Richard T
RT
Martin
John H
JH
D000818:Animals; D001369:Axons / Q000502:physiology / Q000637:transplantation; D009416:Nerve Regeneration / Q000502:physiology*; D020127:Recovery of Function; D013119:Spinal Cord Injuries / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000601:surgery*; D013900:Thoracic Nerves / Q000601:surgery / Q000637:transplantation*