Fig. 1

Fingolimod (FTY720) improves peripheral nerve regeneration by electrophysiological and clinical measures. a C57BL/6 as well as Foxn1 ^−/− mice treated with fingolimod were found to display significantly improved nerve conduction velocities (NCV) compared to wildtype controls. Rag1 ^−/− mice did not show an improvement of nerve regeneration by this measure. Statistical analysis was done by Kruskal-Wallis test and Man-Whitney U test. N = 11/13/11/11/15/17 animals (from left to right). b Nerve conduction was normal in contralateral non-crushed nerves of the same animals. c Assessment of functional recovery was determined by walking track analysis via sciatic functional indices (SFI). Two days before crush sciatic nerve function was normal in all three mouse strains. Seven days post-crush nerve function was significantly impaired in all three mouse strains (P ≤ 0.01) as indicated by a decline in SFI. Note that Rag1 ^−/− control mice showed an additional mean, but non-significant worsening of nerve function. At 14 days post-crush, significantly improved nerve conduction is consistent with significantly improved SFI in fingolimod-treated C57BL/6 and Foxn1 ^−/− animals. No significant difference in SFI was observed in Rag1 ^−/− mice at this stage. N = 8/9/7/6/9/14 animals minimum for each graph (from left to right). Statistical analysis was done by Student’s t test, two-tailed. Data represent mean ± s.e.m. Statistical significance is indicated by asterisks with P ≤ 0.05*, P ≤ 0.01**, and P ≤ 0.001***