Regular Article
Anatomical Correlates of Locomotor Recovery Following Dorsal and Ventral Lesions of the Rat Spinal Cord,☆☆

https://doi.org/10.1006/exnr.2002.7909Get rights and content

Abstract

The present study was designed to relate functional locomotor outcome to the anatomical extent and localization of lesions in the rat spinal cord. We performed dorsal and ventral lesions of different severity in 36 adult rats. Lesion depth, spared total white matter, and spared ventrolateral funiculus were compared to the locomotor outcome, assessed by the BBB open-field locomotor score and the grid walk test. The results showed that the preservation of a small number of fibers in the ventral or lateral funiculus was related to stepping abilities and overground locomotion, whereas comparable tissue preservation in the dorsal funiculus resulted in complete paraplegia. The strongest relation to locomotor function was between the BBB score and the lesion depth as well as the BBB score and the spared white matter tissue in the region of the reticulospinal tract. Locomotion on the grid walk required sparing in the ventrolateral funiculus and additional sparing of the dorsolateral and dorsal funiculus, where the cortico- and rubrospinal tracts are located.

References (50)

  • P.J. Reier et al.

    Fetal cell grafts into resection and contusion/compression injuries of the rat and cat spinal cord

    Exp. Neurol.

    (1992)
  • G.W. Schrimsher et al.

    Forelimb motor performance following dorsal column, dorsolateral funiculi, or ventrolateral funiculi lesions of the cervical spinal cord in the rat

    Exp. Neurol.

    (1993)
  • J.D. Steeves et al.

    Localization of a descending pathway in the spinal cord which is necessary for controlled treadmill locomotion

    Neurosci. Lett.

    (1980)
  • J.D. Steeves et al.

    Effect of noradrenaline and 5-hydroxytryptamine depletion on locomotion in the cat

    Brain Res.

    (1980)
  • P.J Whelan

    Control of locomotion in the decerebrate cat

    Prog. Neurobiol.

    (1996)
  • I.Q. Whishaw et al.

    Paw and limb use in skilled and spontaneous reaching after pyramidal tract, red nucleus and combined lesions in the rat: Behavioral and anatomical dissociations

    Behav. Brain Res.

    (1998)
  • I.Q. Whishaw et al.

    Proximal and distal impairments in rat forelimb use in reaching follow unilateral pyramidal tract lesions

    Behav. Brain Res.

    (1993)
  • J.R. Wrathall et al.

    Spinal cord contusion in the rat: Production of graded, reproducible, injury groups

    Exp. Neurol.

    (1985)
  • F.P. Zemlan et al.

    Ascending and descending projections from nucleus reticularis magnocellularis and nucleus reticularis gigantocellularis: An autoradiographic and horseradish peroxidase study in the rat

    Brain Res.

    (1984)
  • Z Afelt

    Functional significance of ventral descending tracts of the spinal cord in the cat

    Acta Neurobiol. Exp.

    (1974)
  • D.M. Basso et al.

    A sensitive and reliable locomotor rating scale for open field testing in rats

    J. Neurotrauma

    (1995)
  • E.C. Benzel et al.

    A new rat spinal cord injury model: A ventral compression technique

    J. Spinal Disord.

    (1990)
  • B.S. Bregman et al.

    Recovery from spinal cord injury mediated by antibodies to neurite growth inhibitors

    Nature

    (1995)
  • C. Brosamle et al.

    Regeneration of lesioned corticospinal tract fibers in the adult rat induced by a recombinant, humanized IN-1 antibody fragment

    J. Neurosci.

    (2000)
  • Cited by (259)

    View all citing articles on Scopus

    Present address: Faculty of Rehabilitation Medicine, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.

    ☆☆

    To whom correspondence should be addressed at: E-mail: [email protected]. Fax: (780) 492-1626.

    View full text