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takyon writes:

Paralysed mice walk again after a single injection

A new therapy, developed by researchers in the USA, has successfully reversed paralysis and repaired severe spinal cord injuries in mice. The animals regained the ability to walk only four weeks after a single injection of the treatment.

"Our research aims to find a therapy that can prevent individuals from becoming paralysed after major trauma or disease," said Prof Samuel I Stupp of Northwestern University, who led the study. "For decades, this has remained a major challenge for scientists because our body's central nervous system, which includes the brain and spinal cord, does not have any significant capacity to repair itself after injury or after the onset of a degenerative disease."

When the therapy is injected, the liquid immediately forms a network of nanofibres matching the structure around the spinal cord. The difficulty then is in communicating with the body's cells.

[...] "The key innovation in our research, which has never been done before, is to control the collective motion of more than 100,000 molecules within our nanofibres," he said. "By making the molecules move, 'dance' or even leap temporarily out of these structures, known as supramolecular polymers, they are able to connect more effectively with [cellular] receptors."

Also at ScienceAlert.

Journal Reference:
Z. Álvarez, A. N. Kolberg-Edelbrock, I. R. Sasselli, et al. Bioactive scaffolds with enhanced supramolecular motion promote recovery from spinal cord injury, Science (DOI: 10.1126/science.abh3602)

Original Submission