Repair of spinal cord injury by hypoxia-inducible factor-1a-expressing neural stem cells

Neural stem cell (NSC) transplantation is an effective method of giving a supplement of cells lost and promoting functional recovery after spinal cord injury (SCI). Nonetheless, owing to hostile environments at the injury site, such as ischaemic hypoxia conditions and inflammatory cytokines, poor cell survival and uncontrolled differentiation are consistent problems encountered following NSC transplantation in ischaemic neural tissue. Hypoxia-inducible factor-1a (HIF-1α) provides profound protection to NSCs against negative factors at the injury site. On the other hand, HIF-1 can induce NSCs to differentiate into neurons. We predict that transplanted NSCs modified by an HIF-1α gene would have a better efficacy for promoting neural regeneration and functional reconstruction.