ON CNS REPAIR AND PROTECTION STRATEGIES - NOVEL APPROACHES WITH IMPLICATIONS FOR SPINAL-CORD INJURY AND PARKINSONS-DISEASE

In the adult mammalian central nervous system lost nerve cells are not replaced and there is no regeneration of injured axons in white matte r. Together, these two facts mean that there are no spontaneous repara tive mechanisms in operation. Instead, the adult central nervous syste m copes with the risks of injuries and diseases by protective encapsul ation in bone, by a multitude of neuroprotective mechanisms, and final ly by the fact that many important functions are represented by a much larger number of neurons-than minimally needed. The long life expecta ncy of a human being nevertheless means that the risk that the central nervous system is affected by disease, injury or other forms of insul ts for which it cannot fully compensate is relatively high. Experiment ally, two strategies are being pursued in order to develop ways of min imizing various forms of CNS damage, namely neuroprotective and repara tive strategies. Here we present a possible reparative intervention ap plicable to spinal cord injury based on multiple white-to-gray matter peripheral nerve bridge grafts and work based on the specific role of Nurrl for dopamine neuron development, suggesting that development of ligands to transcription factor might be a new inroad to neuroprotecti ve treatments in Parkinson's disease. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. A ll rights reserved.