A spinal cord injury (SCI) disrupts communication between the brain and spinal cord, leading to partial or complete paralysis. But recent breakthroughs suggest an unexpected brain region could play a critical role in restoring mobility.

In 2006, Wolfgang Jäger was in his 30s when a skiing accident left the young Austrian wheelchair-bound from a spinal cord injury. Fast-forward to today, where an innovative deep-brain stimulation technique is helping the 54-year-old Jäger walk and move again.

Researchers at EPFL and Lausanne University Hospital (CHUV), led by professors Grégoire Courtine and Jocelyne Bloch, have achieved a major milestone in the treatment of spinal cord injuries (SCI).

As the team explained, deep brain stimulation involves the implantation of electrodes into specific brain areas to help direct neural activity. It's long been used to treat illnesses such as Parkinson's disease and tremor.

Scientists have identified neurons in the lateral hypothalamus that can be targeted through deep brain stimulation to improve walking after spinal cord injury (SCI). This innovative approach shows promise in both animal models and initial human trials,

Applying deep brain stimulation to a different region in the brain than has been used for other conditions improved the recovery of lower limb movements in two patients with severe spinal cord injuries,

Exactly which bits of the brain are involved in this adaptation is not clear. But, in a paper just published in Nature Medicine, a group of researchers led by Jocelyne Bloch of Lausanne University Hospital and Grégoire Courtine at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne shed some light.

Scientists said Monday that electrically stimulating a particular region in the brain could help people with injured spinal cords walk more easily, with one patient describing how the technique allowe