A Novel Closed-Body Model of Spinal Cord Injury Caused by High-Pressure Air Blasts Produces Extensive Axonal Injury and Motor Impairments.

A Novel Closed-Body Model of Spinal Cord Injury Caused by High-Pressure Air Blasts Produces Extensive Axonal Injury and Motor Impairments. Exp Neurol. 2015 May 6; Authors: Del Mar N, von Buttlar X, Yu AS, Guley NH, Reiner A, Honig MG Abstract Diffuse axonal injury is thought to be the basis of the functional impairments stemming from mild traumatic brain injury. To examine how axons are damaged by traumatic events, such as motor vehicle accidents, falls, sports activities, or explosive blasts, we have taken advantage of the spinal cord with its extensive white matter tracts. We developed a closed-body model of spinal cord injury in mice whereby high-pressure air blasts targeted to lower thoracic vertebral levels produce tensile, compressive, and shear forces within the parenchyma of the spinal cord and thereby cause extensive axonal injury. Markers of cytoskeletal integrity showed that spinal cord axons exhibited three distinct pathologies: microtubule breakage, neurofilament compaction, and calpain-mediated spectrin breakdown. The dorsally situated axons of the corticospinal tract primarily exhibited microtubule breakage, whereas all three pathologies were common in the lateral and ventral white matter. Individual axons typically demonstrated only one of the three pathologies during the first 24 hours after blast injury, suggesting that the different perturbations are initiated independently of one another. For the first few days af...
Source: Experimental Neurology - Category: Neurology Authors: Tags: Exp Neurol Source Type: research