Spinal Cord Injury Recovery Technology

History

2025: Product Announcement

University of Minnesota scientists have created a groundbreaking technology to treat spinal cord injuries that combines 3D printing, stem cells and artificially grown tissue for the first time to fully repair damaged nerve structures. The technique successfully demonstrated the ability to restore function after complete spinal cord rupture in laboratory animal experiments. The results of the study are published in the journal Advanced Healthcare Materials in August 2025.

The developed system is based on the creation of a unique 3D framework with microchannels, made by 3D printing. The organoid construct serves as the basis for the placement of specially prepared neural tissue progenitor cells of the spinal cord.

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Фото: medicalxpress.com

The researchers obtain progenitor cells from adult stem cells, which are then implanted into microchannels of the printed scaffold. This architecture ensures the correct direction of growth of new nerve fibers and forms a "relay system" to bypass the damaged spinal cord.

Experimental tests were conducted on laboratory rats with a completely severed spinal cord - a model that mimics the most severe forms of traumatic injury in humans. After biobuilt implantation, progenitor cells successfully differentiated into functional neurons.

Newly formed nerve cells have demonstrated the ability to germinate from the implanted scaffold in both directions -- to both the brain and peripheral parts of the nervous system. This process ensured the restoration of nerve connections through the injury zone.

Neurosurgery professor Anne Parr noted that regenerative medicine has ushered in a new era in spinal cord injury research. The research team plans to develop development potential for subsequent clinical use in patients, she said.^[1]

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