LED or treatable neurological diseases such as degenerative disease

Experts at Dalhousie University's neuroscience researcher and brain repair center have discovered new methods that can skip the nervous system and directly irritate injured or diseased muscles that lose nerve connections.

When neural failure LED light successfully stimulates muscle directly to prevent atrophy

Professor Victor Rafuse, who teaches at the Department of Neurology of Medicine and also the director of the Brain Rehabilitation Center, and his co-research partner, Zhang Ying (Ying Zhang), an assistant professor in the same department, said that they succeeded in using LEDs. Light stimulates muscles and can cause neurological injury and atrophy caused by neurodegenerative diseases.

Dalhousie surgery resident physician and doctoral candidate Philippe Magown and graduate student Basavaraj Shettar collaborated with Lafferth and Zhang Ying on this major medical breakthrough experiment.

"We have found that just once through the skin, one day of exposure to muscles with no connection to the nerves with an LED light will prevent them from shrinking. Other studies have succeeded in stimulating nerves in the presence of light, but we are the first to be able to skip nerves and act directly. Research on muscles.This study has brought significant progress because of the complete failure of nervous tissue or diseases such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), which cannot be used to stimulate muscles to make muscle work. ."

Relying on LED light to restore muscle function

To test the theory that light can directly stimulate muscle activity, the researchers implanted ion channels in mice that respond to light. This ion channel was first found on unicellular green algae. This ion channel allows the muscles to contract when stimulated by LED blue light.

Scientists seek simple ways to implant light reactive ions into the human body

“Our next step is to develop an ion channel that can directly relay light to the muscles without modifying the gene combinations. This way we may have a way to find a treatment that is feasible for humans.”

For example, Laffers suggested that such ion channels be delivered to the hand muscles of hand muscles that have failed due to injury. "We see the possibility of developing a 'LED light glove' that can be worn to avoid muscle atrophy and that patients can stimulate muscle contraction when they want something."

Unlimited potential applications are expected to help patients with neurological diseases such as degeneracy

There are many potential applications for this new technology that is still in the research stage, including the use of decidua to stimulate patients with degenerative disease, and to help patients suffering from respiratory problems because of neuronal mechanisms and synaptic failures. The respiratory muscles keep the muscles working.