Integrin engineering to promote axon regeneration and Schwann cell migration

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After damage to the spinal cord or brain many nerve fibres are cut. In spinal cord injury this means that motor commands from the brain cannot reach muscles, and sensory information from the skin cannot reach the brain. In order to produce a cure the nerve fibres have to be made to regenerate from the injury point back into the spinal cord and up towards the brain. At present nerve fibre regeneration after spinal cord damage does not succeed, due to many factors such as the scar tissue at the injury site that blocks nerve fibre growth. In the scar tissue there is a molecule called tenascin which nerve fibres could use to grow on, but they lack the receptor molecules to interact with tenascin. The project will put the necessary type of receptor molecules (integrins) on the cut nerve fibres, and will make further modifications to the integrins to prevent them being turned off by inhibitory factors in the scar tissue. A second part of the project is to take a cell type called Schwann cells, which can promote nerve fibre growth, and implant them into spinal cord injuries as a bridge over which the regenerating nerve fibres can grow. In order to make it possible for these cells to integrate into the spinal cord they will also have modifications to their surface integrins.