Combined polymer-curcumin conjugate and ependymal progenitor/stem cell treatment enhances spinal cord injury functional recovery.

Spinal cord injury (SCI) suffers from a lack of effective therapeutic strategies. Animal models of acute SCI have provided evidence that transplantation of ependymal stem/progenitor cells of the spinal cord (epSPCs) induces functional recovery, while systemic administration of the anti-inflammatory curcumin provides neuroprotection. However, functional recovery from chronic stage SCI requires additional enhancements in available therapeutic strategies.

Experimental cell transplantation for traumatic spinal cord injury regeneration: intramedullar or intrathecal administration.

Animal experimentation models are a necessary prerequisite to human trials for the use of regenerative medicine in the treatment of spinal cord injuries. Considerable effort is required for the generation of a consistent and reproducible methodology to incur an injury and evaluate the results. The traumatic contusion model has been accepted as a model that closely mimics a typical human traumatic injury, and here we detail step by step an approach to generate a reproducible lesion in rats.