Paralyzed Man Walks

Read this today on several different science threads.
A man who had a spinal cord injury was able to become free of his wheelchair after participating with a robotic treadmill.

Source

I find it interesting - I've observed patients with spinal cord injury try similar therapies at the Kessler Institute and they showed little improvement. This makes me wonder if there are other factors at work here. For those of you who want to do more reading, this therapy is classified under the topic of "learned non use."

Nice find. I remember a professor saying something about the brain evolving from the spine up. I guess the spinal cord has more authority over motor control than the brain or something. Anyway, here's a site I found while doing some more research.

www.spineuniverse.com...

There's some good articles there.

[edit on 11/30/2005 by Rev_Godslapper]

I've attended lectures by Wise Young, the world's authority on spinal cord injury - when he discussed Learned Non Use - its not that the spinal cord has more of an impact on the brain - it was looked at as a sign of the brain adapting to the lack of stimuli.
Two things could happen
1) Basically the loss of a signal from the normal pathways forces the neurons to look for stimulus in neighboring cells thus making new pathways
2) The cells realize they aren't needed and go under apoptosis.

(Then of course something we don't know at all could happen)

other therapies in learned non use involve stimulating the neurons with electrodes as well.