Spinal Research is very pleased to have been able to award three Nathalie Rose Barr PhD studentships in 2007.

Ms Juan Luo - supervised by Dr Y Zhang and Dr X Bo at Bart’s and the London School of Medicine - is working to improve the effectiveness of Schwann cell transplants. Normal Schwann cells form a clump that plugs the injury site  nerve fibers grow into the clump but become trapped, with few growing out into the intact spinal cord. However, Ms Luo is genetically modifying Schwann cells so that they move away from the injection site, spreading through the spinal cord and creating ‘pathways’ that re-growing nerve fibers follow.

In studies supervised by Dr Elizabeth Bradbury at Kings College London, Lucy Carter is investigating whether the enzyme chondroitinase does more than neutralize the growth inhibitory molecules in scar tissue. Lucy already has evidence that starting treatment immediately after injury protects nerve cells in the brain. It is likely that this ‘neuroprotective’ effect, which reduces the number of nerve cells that die following injury, adds to the beneficial effects of chondroitinase.

The likelihood that simultaneously overcoming two or more the factors that contribute to the lack of re-growth should improve recovery lies behind the third Nathalie Rose Barr studentship. This project also uses gene therapy, this time in nerve fibres. Supervised by Prof Ann Logan (University of Birmingham), Steven Jacques will use gene therapy to (1) block nerve fibres themselves making natural proteins that inhibit growth and (2) boost the production of growth factors that stimulate nerve fibre growth.