Cografts of Adrenal Medulla With Pretransected Peripheral Nerve

It has been reported that adrenal medullary grafts enhance recovery of striatal dopamine (DA) fibers in MPTP-treated mice/1,2/. Since adrenal medullary chromaffin cells contain several trophic factors such as gangliosides and basic fibroblast growth factor, an increase in survivability of grafted chromaffin cells might enhance the degree of host DA fiber recovery. The content of nerve growth factor (NGF) in the distal stump of transected sciatic nerve increases more than twenty times one day after transection/3/. In this study, we performed cografts of adrenal medulla with pretransected peripheral nerve and observed the survival of grafted chromaffin cells and the degree of host intrinsic DA fiber recovery.