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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Neural Circuits
Volume 18 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fncir.2024.1480291

Electrical Stimulation of the Sciatic Nerve Restores Inspiratory Diaphragm Function in Mice after Spinal Cord Injury

Provisionally accepted
Ian Walling Ian Walling 1,2Sarah Baumgartner Sarah Baumgartner 3Mitesh Patel Mitesh Patel 4Steven Allen Crone Steven Allen Crone 3,5,6*
  • 1 Neuroscience Graduate Program, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati, United States
  • 2 Medical Scientist Training Program, University of Cincinnati, College of Medicine, Cincinnati, United States
  • 3 Division of Pediatric Neurosurgery, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, Ohio, United States
  • 4 Neurobiology Program, University of Cincinnati, College of Arts and Sciences, Cincinnati, United States
  • 5 Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, United States
  • 6 Division of Neurosurgery, College of Medicine, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH, United States

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Spinal cord injury in the high cervical cord can impair breathing due to disruption of pathways between brainstem respiratory centers and respiratory motor neurons in the spinal cord. Passive limb movements or electrical stimulation of limb afferents have been shown to increase ventilation in healthy humans and animals. Here we tested the impact of hindlimb afferent stimulation on diaphragm function in uninjured mice as well as following a cervical (C2) hemisection spinal cord injury. We first used diaphragm electromyography to show that sciatic nerve stimulation, which activates hindlimb afferents, could increase the frequency and amplitude of diaphragm inspiratory bursts in an uninjured anesthetized mouse, as had previously been shown in other species. We next showed that electrical stimulation of the sciatic nerve (left or right sides) at sufficient current thresholds could increase inspiratory activity in the previously paralyzed diaphragm ipsilateral to a C2 hemisection injury at either acute (1 day) or chronic (2 months) stages after injury. Our findings indicate that therapies targeting limb afferents could potentially be used to improve breathing in patients with cervical spinal cord injury and provide an experimental model to further investigate the neural pathways by which limb afferents can increase respiratory muscle activity.

    Keywords: spinal cord injury, Respiration, nerve stimulation, Sciatic Nerve, sensory afferent, Electromyography, Diaphragm

    Received: 13 Aug 2024; Accepted: 09 Dec 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Walling, Baumgartner, Patel and Crone. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Steven Allen Crone, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, United States

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