Spinal Cord Society Research Center, Fort Collins, CO 80526, USA.
J Neurosci Methods. 2010 Mar 30;187(2):183-9. doi: 10.1016/j.jneumeth.2010.01.008. Epub 2010 Jan 14.
Walking or stepping has been considered the result from the activation of the central pattern generator (CPG). In most patients with spinal cord injury (SCI) the CPG is undamaged. To date, there are no noninvasive approaches for activating the CPG. Recently we developed a noninvasive technique, tail nerve electrical stimulation (TANES), which can induce positive hind limb movement of SCI rats. The purpose of this study is to introduce the novel technique and examine the effect of TANES on CPG activation. A 25 mm contusion injury was produced at spinal cord T10 of female, adult Long-Evans rats by using the NYU impactor device. Rats received TANES ( approximately 40 mA at 4 kHz) 7 weeks after injury. During TANES all injured rats demonstrated active body weight-supported stepping of hind limbs with left-right alternation and occasional front-hind coordination, resulting in significant, temporary increase in BBB scores (p<0.01). However, there is no response to TANES from rats with L2 transection, consistent with other reports that the CPG may be located at L1-2. S1 transection negatively implies the key role of TANES in CPG activation. The TANES not only renders paralyzed rats with a technique-induced ability to walk via activating CPG, but also is likely to be used for locomotor training. It has more beneficial effects for physical training over other training paradigms including treadmill training and invasive functional electrical stimulation. Therefore the TANES may have considerable potential for achieving improvement of functional recovery in animal models and a similar method may be suggested for human study.
行走或跨步被认为是中枢模式发生器（CPG）激活的结果。在大多数脊髓损伤（SCI）患者中，CPG 未受损。迄今为止，尚无激活 CPG 的非侵入性方法。最近，我们开发了一种非侵入性技术，即尾巴神经电刺激（TANES），它可以诱导 SCI 大鼠产生阳性后肢运动。本研究的目的是介绍这项新技术，并研究 TANES 对 CPG 激活的影响。通过使用 NYU 撞击器装置，在雌性成年 Long-Evans 大鼠的脊髓 T10 处产生 25mm 的挫伤损伤。在损伤后 7 周，大鼠接受 TANES（约 40mA 在 4kHz 下）。在 TANES 期间，所有受伤的大鼠都表现出活跃的体重支撑性后肢踏步，左右交替，偶尔前后协调，导致 BBB 评分显著暂时增加（p<0.01）。然而，从 L2 横切的大鼠没有对 TANES 产生反应，这与其他报告一致，即 CPG 可能位于 L1-2。S1 横切暗示 TANES 在 CPG 激活中的关键作用。TANES 不仅通过激活 CPG 使瘫痪大鼠获得技术诱导的行走能力，而且可能用于运动训练。与其他训练模式（包括跑步机训练和侵入性功能性电刺激）相比，它对身体训练具有更有益的效果。因此，TANES 可能具有在动物模型中实现功能恢复改善的相当大的潜力，类似的方法也可能被建议用于人类研究。
