A drug best known for kick-starting bone marrow to make red blood cells has reversed brain damage due to strokes in test mice.
William D. Hill, a neuroscientist at the Medical College of Georgia in Augusta, and his colleagues surgically induced strokes in the mice, reducing the animals’ propensity to explore an unfamiliar environment. Mice subsequently given injections of the protein erythropoietin increased their explorations over the next 4 weeks, whereas mice given saline injections showed a smaller boost, Hill says.
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