Modulation of Both Intrinsic and Extrinsic Factors Additively Promotes Rewiring of Corticospinal Circuits after Spinal Cord Injury

Axon regeneration after spinal cord injury (SCI) is limited by both a decreased intrinsic ability of neurons to grow axons and the growth-hindering effects of extrinsic inhibitory molecules expressed around the lesion. Deletion of phosphatase and tensin homolog (Pten) augments mechanistic target of rapamycin (mTOR) signaling and enhances the intrinsic regenerative response of injured corti-cospinal neurons after SCI. Because of the variety of growth-restrictive extrinsic molecules, it remains unclear how inhibition of con-served inhibitory signaling elements would affect axon regeneration and rewiring after SCI. Moreover, it remains unknown how a combinatorial approach to modulate both extrinsic and intrinsic mechanisms can enhance regeneration and rewiring after SCI. In the present study, we deleted RhoA and RhoC, which encode small GTPases that mediate growth inhibition signals of a variety of extrin-sic molecules, to remove global extrinsic pathways. RhoA/RhoC double deletion in mice suppressed retraction or dieback of corticospi-nal axons after SCI. In contrast, Pten deletion increased regrowth of corticospinal axons into the lesion core. Although deletion of both RhoA and Pten did not promote axon regrowth across the lesion or motor recovery, it additively promoted rewiring of cortico-spinal circuits connecting the cerebral cortex, spinal cord, and hindlimb muscles. Our genetic findings, therefore, reveal that a combi-natorial approach to modulate both intrinsic and extrinsic factors can additively promote neural circuit rewiring after SCI.

Automated summary

Deleting RhoA and RhoC genes to eliminate extrinsic inhibitory pathways, as well as deleting the PTEN gene to enhance intrinsic regenerative response, were found to promote neural circuit rewiring through a combinatorial approach. While this method increased the potential for rewiring, it did not significantly impact axon regrowth across the lesion and motor recovery.