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Trial Lecture – time and place
See Trial Lecture.
Adjudication committee
- First opponent: Professor Volker Tronnier, University of Lübeck, Germany
- Second opponent: Research Assistant Professor Guillermo Garcia Alias, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Spain
- Third member and chair of the evaluation committee: Professor Elisabeth Gulowsen Celius, University of Oslo
Chair of the Defence
Professor Farrukh Abbas Chaudhry, University of Oslo
Principal Supervisor
Associate Professor Jean-Luc Boulland, University of Oslo
Summary
In this dissertation, I describe the development of two different animal models to study spinal cord injury. This provides both the opportunity to investigate basic mechanisms, as well as cover the need to test experimental therapies for spinal cord injury. Both animal models have in common that no commercially available devices exists to create a reliable spinal cord injury. Therefore, separate devices were developed. Apparatus development, protocol implementation, and reproducibility is an important part of this dissertation. The first model was developed in newborn mice. The dissertation includes a detailed description of the protocol for anesthesia, surgical procedure and functional consequences. Spinal cord injuries that occur at a young age are followed by a high degree of spontaneous functional recovery, which does not occur in adults. This gives us opportunities to characterize the molecular and cellular mechanisms that underlie this spontaneous recovery. Insight into these mechanisms are important to develop new therapeutic strategies for spinal cord injury.
The second model is developed in pigs. Most experimental therapies for spinal cord injury that showed promising results have been tested in rodents. However, when applied in human clinical trials, they mostly failed. Therefore, in the international research community for spinal cord injury, a consensus for the need to establish large animal models to study spinal cord injury exists. In this dissertation, I describe the development of a reproducible pig model. Pigs were chosen because the injury, as well as the size, the anatomy, the physiology, and complexity of the spinal cord are more similar to the situation in humans. Use of this model will provide more translatable and reliable information about whether a potential experimental treatment may work in humans with spinal cord injuries.
Additional information
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