All posts tagged: spinal

Europe’s breakthrough in reversing paralysis after spinal cord injury

Europe’s breakthrough in reversing paralysis after spinal cord injury

Published by skeptic

Once considered impossible, restoring movement after paralysis is becoming a reality thanks to EU-funded researchers who have developed a device that reconnects the brain to the body. Spinal cord injury (SCI) remains one of the most devastating neurological conditions, severing communication between the brain and the body and leaving millions worldwide with permanent paralysis. Despite decades of research, restoring movement after spinal cord injury has remained one of neuroscience’s most intractable problems. An EU-funded initiative supported by the European Innovation Council offers a new route: a fully implantable brain–spine interface that reconnects mind and body, offering fresh hope against paralysis. “Treating patients with paralysis remains one of the greatest challenges of humanity,” said Professor Grégoire Courtine, the neuroscientist at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland, who led the breakthrough research. He said researchers have tried for decades – and failed – to regrow neurons and fibres with biological approaches. “We have completely changed the approach. Instead of trying to repair the actual injury, we are focusing on what is intact below the injury, but …

How to Have Sex to Spinal Tap II: the seven best films to watch on TV this week | Television & radio

How to Have Sex to Spinal Tap II: the seven best films to watch on TV this week | Television & radio

Published by Sam Flores

Pick of the week How to Have Sex The fraught territory of sex and consent among young people gets a working over in Molly Manning Walker’s bruising, disquieting debut feature. Mia McKenna-Bruce stars as the achingly vulnerable 16-year-old Tara who, along with best mates Skye (Lara Peake) and Em (Enva Lewis), goes on holiday to Malia in Crete. It’s party central for the teenage trio in a cycle of drink, dance, eat chips, sleep and repeat. But teaming up with older hotel neighbours Paddy and Badger (Ladhood’s Samuel Bottomley and Shaun Thomas) – and Tara’s uncertainty about losing her virginity amid the “anything goes” atmosphere at the resort – lead to jealousy, peer pressure and worse. Thursday, 9pm, Film4 Spinal Tap II: The End Continues Ready for the reunion? … Spinal Tap II: The End Continues. Photograph: Kyle Kaplan/AP Fifteen years after the band split, film-maker Marty DiBergi (Rob Reiner) is back to document the build-up to their reunion concert in New Orleans. It’s an elegiac outing for Christopher Guest, Michael McKean and Harry Shearer’s …

Electrical stimulation can restore ability to move limbs after spinal cord injury

Electrical stimulation can restore ability to move limbs after spinal cord injury

Published by Jenni Sidey

One participant pointed to her chest. That, she explained, is where she felt her foot hit the treadmill. Not the foot itself, not the ground beneath it, but a sensation somewhere above the injury that her brain had learned to translate into something useful. “It wasn’t like I could feel my foot hit the treadmill or anything like that,” she said, “but it was close.” Close is a word that carries real weight in spinal cord injury research. For people who have lost all sensation and movement below the waist, close to normal is not a consolation. It is a clinical milestone. A team from Brown University, Rhode Island Hospital, and VA Providence Healthcare has now reported results from a small but significant clinical trial, the first to demonstrate simultaneous motor control and sensory feedback in people with complete spinal cord injuries. The findings were published in Nature Biomedical Engineering. David Borton (left), an asociate professor of engineering and brain science at Brown, and Jonathan Calvert (right), an assistant professor at UC Davis who led …

Little Mix star Jesy Nelson in tears after hitting target for spinal muscular atrophy campaign | UK News

Little Mix star Jesy Nelson in tears after hitting target for spinal muscular atrophy campaign | UK News

Published by Sam Flores

Jesy Nelson broke down in tears after her campaign for more health checks on babies reached 100,000 signatures – meaning it must be debated by MPs. The 34-year-old’s twins, Ocean Jade and Story Monroe Nelson-Foster, suffer from a rare genetic condition, spinal muscular atrophy (SMA), after being born prematurely in May. On Thursday the Little Mix singer’s petition to see newborns checked for more serious health conditions hit 100,000 – ensuring it will be debated in Parliament. “I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe. It’s too much,” she said in a video posted to Instagram. Instagram This content is provided by Instagram, which may be using cookies and other technologies. To show you this content, we need your permission to use cookies. You can use the buttons below to amend your preferences to enable Instagram cookies or to allow those cookies just once. You can change your settings at any time via the Privacy Options. Unfortunately we have been unable to verify if you have consented to Instagram cookies. To view this content you can use …

Gary Numan’s wife Gemma, 57, left partially paralyzed after spinal surgery

Gary Numan’s wife Gemma, 57, left partially paralyzed after spinal surgery

Published by Daniella Wilson

Get the inside track from Roisin O’Connor with our free weekly music newsletter Now Hear This Get our free music newsletter Now Hear This Get our free music newsletter Now Hear This Gary Numan’s wife Gemma has been left partially paralyzed after undergoing spinal surgery, just months after the singer revealed his brother had died suddenly following a heart attack. Gemma, 57, told fans in a post on Instagram that her left arm is now paralyzed following a multi-level discectomy, which is a procedure to remove damaged or herniated discs. “No one can ever understand how s**t it is and not glamorous,” she added. Gary and Gemma married in 1997 and have three daughters: Persia, Raven and Echo. The couple live in Los Angeles but Gemma had her surgery in the UK, and said she has been unable to travel back to the States since September last year. open image in gallery Gemma shared her health news beside a snap of her and Gary (Instagram/Gemma Numan) “Gutted!” she wrote. “I miss my animals so much, …

A Johns Hopkins-trained spinal surgeon says these are the two stretches you should be doing if you work at a desk

A Johns Hopkins-trained spinal surgeon says these are the two stretches you should be doing if you work at a desk

Published by Jenni Sidey

Often, the advice I read on how to properly care for my spine can feel difficult to apply to my life. I work at a desk and know that I shouldn’t be sitting down for the whole day, but it can be hard to remember to take a movement break when I’m focused on a task. I imagine it’s even worse if you drive for a living—frequently stopping to stretch will seriously slow your progress. You may like Unfortunately, if you don’t pay attention to your spinal health before it becomes a problem, you may develop a painful issue that is anything but straightforward to fix. So what should you do? Are there ways to care for your spine if you work in a seated position? I asked an expert. Dr Gbolahan Okubadejo is a board-certified spinal and orthopedic surgeon who leads The Institute of Comprehensive Spine Care in New York. He shared his thoughts with me on how to use props to better support your spine when sitting, and the two non-negotiable stretches all …

Scientists find evidence of Epstein-Barr virus activity in spinal fluid of multiple sclerosis patients

Scientists find evidence of Epstein-Barr virus activity in spinal fluid of multiple sclerosis patients

Published by José Betancourt

Emerging research has provided fresh evidence regarding the role of viral infection in the development of multiple sclerosis. By analyzing immune cells extracted from the spinal fluid of patients, scientists identified a specific population of “killer” T cells that appear to target the Epstein-Barr virus. The findings suggest that an immune response directed at this common pathogen may drive the neurological damage associated with the disease. The study was published in the journal Nature Immunology. Multiple sclerosis is a chronic condition in which the immune system mistakenly attacks myelin, the protective sheath covering nerve fibers in the central nervous system. This damage disrupts communication between the brain and the rest of the body. For decades, scientific inquiry focused heavily on CD4+ T cells. These are immune cells that help coordinate the body’s defense response. However, pathologists have observed that a different type of immune cell is actually more abundant in the brain lesions of patients. These are CD8+ T cells, also known as cytotoxic or “killer” T cells. Their primary function is to destroy cells …

Noninvasive brain scanning could restore movement after spinal cord injury

Noninvasive brain scanning could restore movement after spinal cord injury

Published by Jenni Sidey

An individual may become completely paralyzed because of any number of accidents that interfere with the functioning of the nerves in their body. People who have lost the ability to walk due to spinal cord injuries often continue to feel movement in their legs and arms, and the brain sends movement signals to their limbs. However, the spinal cord prevents the brain’s signals from reaching the legs and arms. Scientists in Italy and Switzerland are working together to figure out if they can read brain signals, like those from electroencephalography (EEG), that happen in the brain when we perform an action, and then send the read signals to a spinal cord stimulator to help restore mobility. The research has been compiled and published in APL Bioengineering. Many universities in Europe contributed to this research, but it was coordinated by Laura Toni from Università Vita Salute San Raffaele and her team. The researchers at the various European universities have created a way to use EEG technology to read brain signal patterns and help restore voluntary movement …

Silent spinal cord cells may hold the key to healing after devastating injuries and brain disease

Silent spinal cord cells may hold the key to healing after devastating injuries and brain disease

Published by Jenni Sidey

Silent cells deep in your spinal cord may hold a surprising key to healing after devastating injuries and brain disease. A new study from Cedars-Sinai, reveals that support cells called astrocytes do far more than watch from the sidelines. They help coordinate cleanup and repair across long stretches of the central nervous system, and they do it from far away. Rethinking the Role of Astrocytes Astrocytes sit throughout your brain and spinal cord, wrapping around nerve fibers and blood vessels. They help keep neurons healthy, balance chemicals and support the flow of electrical signals that let you move, feel and think. After an injury, scientists have mostly focused on astrocytes right at the damage site. Those local cells form a scar and shield nearby tissue. Joshua Burda, PhD, a neuroscientist at Cedars-Sinai, and his team took a different view. Spatiotemporal molecular decoding of SCI LRAs. (CREDIT: Nature) “We discovered that astrocytes far from the site of an injury actually help drive spinal cord repair,” said Burda, assistant professor of Biomedical Sciences and Neurology and senior …

New platform aims to transform the study of spinal cord biology

New platform aims to transform the study of spinal cord biology

Published by skeptic

A newly developed platform aims to create a high-fidelity 4D model of the human spinal cord using advanced bioprinting techniques and patient-derived cells. Developed with funding from the ERC Consolidator Grant, the SPINECRAFT platform will create a cutting-edge, 4D human spinal cord construct that mirrors the architecture and functionality of the real spinal cord. This ambitious approach represents a paradigm shift in central nervous system (CNS) research. SPINECRAFT will set new standards in tissue engineering and open doors to breakthroughs in neurodegenerative disease modelling and regenerative therapies –pushing the boundaries of what is possible in neuroscience. “We finally have the tools to ask questions that were previously inaccessible – and move closer to real treatments for patients,” stated Zaida Álvarez Pinto, Principal Investigator at the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC), who was awarded the ERC Grant. Limitations of current central nervous system models Current laboratory models of the CNS struggle to replicate its extraordinary complexity, limiting progress in understanding neurological and neurodegenerative diseases. Traditional 2D cultures, 3D organoids and animal models fall short of …