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ARTICLE | Clinical News

Neuralstem preclinical data

September 17, 2012 7:00 AM UTC

In rats with surgically transected spinal cords at the third thoracic vertebrae, neural stem cells given 7 days after injury led to significant recovery of locomotor function over the following 7 weeks vs. untreated controls. Specifically, rats transplanted with the neural stem cells regained movement in all lower extremity joints. Additionally, 57% of the grafted cells turned into neurons. From the neurons, Neuralstem said a "remarkable" number of axons emerged that extended over 17 spinal segments both above and below the point of spinal cord lesion. The company also said the axons appeared to make reciprocal synaptic connectivity with the host rat spinal cord neurons in gray matter. Furthermore, re-transection of the spinal cord immediately above the graft reversed the functional gain, which Neuralstem said indicates that regeneration of host axons into the stem cell graft was responsible for the functional recovery. Data were published in Cell. ...