A severed spinal cord or damage to the the optic nerve used to be considered irrepairable. Recent developments by researchers from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of Hong Kong, and the Fourth Military Medical University,, Xian, China have used a self-assembling peptide scaffold to repair severed brain structures in blind rodents and restore their sight[Ellis-Behnke et al., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA (2006) 103, 5054].

Injecting a 1% peptide scaffold solution into the gap between severed brain tissue promoted axon regrowth and a closing up of the gap. The self-assembling material biodegrades and does not appear to provoke a significant immune response. A second series of experiments will look at repairing damage due to strokes.

Source: nanotoday