>> Research Projects >> Bioactive hollow fiber membranes

Developing bioactive HFMs for the treatment of spinal cord injury and neurodegenerative diseases

Following adult central nervous system (CNS) injury, resident cells and blood-derived inflammatory cells become activated and migrate to the lesion site, eventually form a dense glial scar that is believed to play a significant role in inhibiting CNS regeneration. The inhibitory nature of the glial scar is due not only to the existence of inflammatory cell types, but also to the ECM molecules that are derived from them. In particular, chrondroitin sulfate proteoglycan (CSPG), a family of ECM molecules secreted by astrocytes, and myelin associated glycoprotein (MAG) and so on derived from oligodendrocytes have been shown to upregulate in the glial scar and inhibit neurite extension, and the digestion of CSPG or conversion of repulsive to permissive of MAG has enhanced axonal regeneration after CNS injury. In this project, we are developing bioactive bridging device  with the roles of suppressing glial scar formation to promote CNS axonal regeneration. One example is shown below.

Fig. 1: Adult brain tissue reaction to PNPX loaded HFMs (A, C, E) or non-loaded HFMs (B, D, F). (A), (B): CSPG staining pattern; (C), (D): GFAP staining pattern for astrocyte; (E), (F): overlapped pattern of CSPG and GFAP. Blue is DAPI staining for nuclei. The number of reactive astrocytes and the amount of CSPG surrounding the PNPX delivery zone is significantly (P<0.05) lower than that for the control, suggesting that PNPX may suppress glial scarring response after CNS injury.