Artificial Nerve Branches for Innervation of Paralyzed Muscles

When a nerve trunk is injured at a level at which important muscular branches are given off, it follows almost invariably that the muscles supplied by these branches are permanently paralyzed, since no path for the conduction of neuraxes from the nerve trunk to the muscle is available. To find a means of forming nerve branches artificially, so that such a path may be furnished for the neurotization of muscles, has been the object of this research. Experimentally, a method has been found whereby a nerve trunk may be made to grow nerve branches at any level in its course and to supply any given muscle which it may formerly have supplied. A muscle normally in the domain of one nerve may be reinnervated by an artificial nerve branch from another nerve without impairing materially the function of the latter. Artificial nerve branches may be made by using a free