Israeli Scientists Reverse Paralysis In Mice Using Human Implants, Hope To Begin Human Trials ‘Within 3 Years’

JERUSALEM (VINnews) — In a trailblazing experiment conducted in an Israeli lab, scientists succeeded in making paralyzed mice walk by giving them spinal cord implants. The scientists claim that they are less than three years away from doing the same for humans in clinical trials, according to a report by Times of Israel.

The innovative experiment took place at Tel Aviv University, where a large team engineered spinal cord tissue from human cells, and implanted them into 15 mice with long-term paralysis. Twelve of the mice then walked normally, the scientists revealed on Monday in newly peer-reviewed research published in the distinguished journal Advanced Science.

“If this works in humans, and we believe that it will, it can offer all paralyzed people hope that they may walk again,” Prof. Tal Dvir’s research team at the Sagol Center for Regenerative Biotechnology told The Times of Israel, adding that discussions regarding clinical trials have been opened with America’s Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

Dvir said that although the mice received spinal implants from three different people, the plan for humans is to grow the spinal tissue using cells from the patient’s own body. He believes that this could “enable regeneration of the damaged tissue with no risk of rejection,” and would eliminate the need to suppress the immune systems of recipients, as happens in the case of many transplants.

“There are millions of people around the world who are paralyzed due to spinal injury, and there is still no effective treatment for their condition,” Dvir said.

“People injured at a very young age are destined to sit in a wheelchair for the rest of their lives, bearing all the social, financial, and health-related costs of paralysis. We hope to solve this and help them to walk.”

The unique aspect of Dvir’s research is that it focuses on growing pieces of spine from human cells and then transplanting them into the spine to repair it. Moreover the research focused on cells from long-term paralysis whereas previous studies had only worked on newly paralyzed animals.

Dvir said that the process starts with a small biopsy from the belly.

“We separate the fat cells from other materials such as collagen and sugars, and reprogram the cells using genetic engineering methods, so they can ‘become’ any cell in the body,” he explained.

“We put the cells in a substance that we make from the non-cellular material from the fat tissue gathered in the biopsy, put the cells inside it for 30 days, and we mimic how a spinal cord develops in an embryo. This produces spinal cord micro-neuron tissue, which we transplant into animals that have been paralyzed for a long time.”

A new company has been formed to bring the technology to clinical trials, and Dvir expects this to happen within two and a half years. He stressed that while the experiment so far involved mice, the implants were grown from humans cells, meaning that the research is already at an advanced stage.

“We’ve been using human implants on the mice, not mice implants, which means we’re not going back to the beginning of research to move over to humans. Rather, we know how to prepare the implants for humans, which is what makes us optimistic we will move quickly to clinical trials,” he said.

His team, which includes Lior Wertheim, Dr. Reuven Edri, and Dr. Yona Goldshmit, believes that the new method has relevance beyond spinal injury, and are now exploring using it for a range of other diseases and injuries, such as Parkinson’s disease, brain trauma, myocardial infarction, and age-related macular degeneration.