Spinal cord injury: reversing the incorrect cortical maps by inductive lability procedure

Within the brain-stem and on the cerebral cortex there are locomotor control centers arranged in a ladder-form control system. These centers are somatotopic, self-organizing neural network maps capable of simultaneously learning and task execution. In spinal cord injury (SCI) these self-organized maps get erroneously re-organized and maladaptively stabilized. The extent and quality of sensory-motor recovery, if any appears, is affected by and compromised due to incorrect mapping processes. The treatment method based on inductive lability procedure (Krishnan, 2003a, 2003b, 2003c) uses botulinum toxin for the purpose. It recreates competition among synapses in a locomotor training-based corrective re-self-organization of the maps in various steps of the ladder.