A promising new anti-cancer drug may prove to be even more promising - for a completely unrelated health problem. A report in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences shows that mice paralyzed by spinal cord injury and then treated with the drug recover the ability to walk within 2 to 12 days. The drug in question, called CM101, is an antiangiogenic - that is, it prevents the formation of blood vessels. These sorts of drugs are used as anti-cancer drugs. They choke off developing tumours, which rely on their ability to build new blood vessels for their oxygen and food supplies.
But Artur W. Wamil and colleagues at Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee thought of a completely different use for CM101. They?ve used it to help mice recover from spinal cord injury. When the spinal cord is injured, there is both immediate mechanical damage and later tissue degeneration. Part of the response to the damage is inflammation and the development of scar tissue - both of which get in the way of the nerve?s repairing itself.
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