BACKGROUND:Several studies have demonstrated embryonic stem cells induced neural precursor cells can promote functional recovery in rats with spinal cord injury.
OBJECTIVE:To study the effect of in vitro cultured embryonic stem cells induced neural precursor cells in rats with spinal cord injury.
METHODS:Total y 144 rats were randomly divided into three groups. Experiment group and control group rats had spinal cord transection injury. Embryonic stem cells-derived cells were injected into the vertebral canal at rostral and caudal segment perilesional y for the experiment group whereas PBS solution was injected instead of cells in the control group. Sham surgery group rats had only laminectomy without any spinal cord injury and treatment.
RESULTS AND CONCLUSION:The experimental result showed that at day 21 post-injury, the regional expression of transforming growth factor-β1 was greater in rats from the control group in comparison to the experiment group (P<0.05). At each time point after spinal cord injury in rats, the expression of myelin basic protein in the spinal cord was significantly higher in the experiment group than the control group (P<0.05). After celltransplantation, Basso, Beattie, and Bresnahan scores of the experiment group at different time points were significantly higher than those of the control group (P<0.05). Transplantation of in vitro cultured embryonic stem cells induced neural precursor cells can reduce the late expression of transforming growth factor-β1, and can increase the expression of myelin basic protein which contributes to the recovery of rats with completely transected spinal cord injury.