Aida Rodrigo Albors

Spinal cord regeneration across species.

Aida Rodrigo Albors is a Chancellor’s Fellow and Wellcome Career Development Fellow at the Centre for Regenerative Medicine. Her research seeks to understand why some animals can regenerate while others cannot, with a focus on the spinal cord. Her group works across species with diverse regenerative capabilities including axolotls, spiny mice and mice, and uses in vivo models of spinal cord injury, single-cell genomics, molecular biology and microscopy to discover the mechanisms that support and block spinal cord regeneration.

Aida carried out her PhD with Elly Tanaka in the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics and the Centre for Regenerative Therapies Dresden, Germany, where she discovered that spinal cord cells in axolotls revert to an embryonic-like state to regenerate. For her postdoctoral research, Aida joined Kate Storey at the University of Dundee, UK. Here, she gained mouse and single-cell genomics expertise to start delving into why mice are not as efficient as axolotls at resolving spinal cord injuries.

portrait photo of Aida Rodrigo Albors
Aida Rodrigo Albors

Aida started her group at the Centre for Regenerative Medicine in The University of Edinburgh in April 2023.

Lydia Lorenzo Cisneros, Laura Arbanas, Landy Zhou, and Benoît Bouloudi


The ability to regenerate the injured spinal cord varies greatly among species, ranging from full regeneration in axolotls, to partial regeneration in spiny mice (Acomys), to very poor or no regeneration in mice and humans. What are the cellular and molecular mechanisms responsible for these differences in regenerative capacity? Can we use insights from axolotl and spiny mice to unlock spinal cord regeneration in mice and eventually, humans?

In axolotl

Making the right number of cells and the right cell types is essential for regeneration. Ependymal cells, the cells lining the central canal of the spinal cord, are the only cell type that retains the capacity to self-renew and generate all neural cell types in the adult spinal cord. In axolotls, these are the cells that fully regenerate the spinal cord. We found that to do so, axolotl ependymal cells access developmental-like gene expression programmes and speed up the cell cycle, essentially recapitulating embryonic development, to rebuild the spinal cord. We are now investigating how this injury-induced reprogramming is initiated and executed to transform a specialised cell type into a highly regenerative cell.


Axolotl tail regeneration

Figure Legend
Rapid, organised expansion of spinal cord cells during tail regeneration in the axolotl. Images are a side view of the spinal cord (greyscale, cells’ cytoskeleton), with dashed lines indicating the injury site.

In spiny mice 

Ependymal cells in mice can also behave as neural stem cells when cultured in a dish and, like their axolotl counterparts, are quick to respond to injury. However, unlike axolotl ependymal cells, mouse ependymal cells undergo only a transient burst of cell divisions and cannot make neurons or restore function in the injured spinal cord. We have found that mouse ependymal cells are a diverse cell population and some hints that cell maturation and specialisation could come at the expense of their regeneration potential. We are exploring potential roadblocks that prevent mouse ependymal cells to adopt a more pro-regenerative, neurogenic cell state following injury. We are also investigating how ependymal cells in the spiny mouse, one of the few mammalian regenerators, contribute to a successful spinal cord response to injury.

Rodrigo Albors A, Singer GA, Llorens-Bobadilla E, Frisén J, May AP, Ponting CP, Storey KG. An ependymal cell census identifies heterogeneous and ongoing cell maturation in the adult mouse spinal cord that changes dynamically on injury. Dev Cell. 2023 Feb 6;58(3):239-255.e10. doi: 10.1016/j.devcel.2023.01.003.

Cura Costa E, Otsuki L, Rodrigo Albors A, Tanaka EM, Chara O. Spatiotemporal control of cell cycle acceleration during axolotl spinal cord regeneration. Elife. 2021 May 14;10:e55665. doi: 10.7554/eLife.55665.

Rost F, Rodrigo Albors A, Mazurov V, Brusch L, Deutsch A, Tanaka EM, Chara O. Accelerated cell divisions drive the outgrowth of the regenerating spinal cord in axolotls. Elife. 2016 Nov 25;5:e20357. doi: 10.7554/eLife.20357.

Rodrigo Albors A, Tazaki A, Rost F, Nowoshilow S, Chara O, Tanaka EM. Planar cell polarity-mediated induction of neural stem cell expansion during axolotl spinal cord regeneration. Elife. 2015 Nov 14;4:e10230. doi: 10.7554/eLife.10230.


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