Schwann Cells Overexpressing FGF-2 Alone or Combined with Manual Stimulation Do Not Promote Functional Recovery after Facial Nerve Injury

Table 3

Quality of target muscle reinnervation. Reinnervation pattern of the levator labii superioris motor-end plates in intact rats, in rats after transection of the right facial nery followed by:- entubulation with collagen only, with collagen plus naive SC's, or with collagen plus genetically modified SC's. In group 6–9 entubulations were followed by manual mechanical stimulation (MS) of the vibrissal muscles. Motor endplates were classified a monoinnervated, polyinnervated, or noninnervated according to the number of beta-tubulin-immunoreactive axons that crossed th boundaries of the end-plate).

Group of animals	Monoinnervated motor end-plates (percent)	Polyinnervated motor end-plates (percent)	Noninnervated motor end-plates (percent)	Total number of motor end-plates examined
1. Intact SD rats	100 ± 0.0	0.0	0.0	1633 ± 143
2. Collagen only	44 ± 8.0*	46± 10*	10 ± 3.0*	1521 ± 162
3. Collagen +neonatal, naive SC's	42 ± 8.0*	49± 4.0*	9.0 ± 2.0*	1404 ± 108
4. Collagen + SC-FGF-2^18kD	49 ± 7.0*	45± 12*	6.0 ± 1.0*	1464 ± 159
5. Collagen + SC-FGF-2^21/23kD	48 ± 16*	47± 15*	5.0 ± 4.0*	1602 ± 258
6. Collagen only + MS	47 ± 9.0*	51± 10*	2.0 ± 1.0*	1362 ± 303
7. Collagen + neonatal, naive SC's + MS	40 ± 8.0*	48± 10*	12±3.0*	1512±102
8. Collagen + SC-FGF-2^18kD + MS	41 ± 3.0*	49± 11*	10±1.0*	1413±141
9. Collagen + SC-FGF-2^21/23kD + MS	51 ± 8.0*	42± 10*	7 ± 3.0*	1602 ± 150

*Significant differences of group mean values (ANOVA and post-hoc Tukey's test, 𝑃<.05 from intact rats.