Geoffrey Raisman, a renowned British neuroscientist, has never forgotten the day he first realised that his hypothesis on how severed spinal cord nerves could be repaired just might be correct.

A rat had been prevented from moving its left paw by a lesion in its nervous system. Cells from its nose had then been grafted into the lesion in the hope that they would grow across the gap in the nerve pathway and restore function.

Offering the rat some food in the middle of the night, Raisman could hardly believe his eyes when it put forward its left paw to accept the morsel. It was, he has said, a once in a lifetime moment.

Raisman, director of the Spinal Repair Unit at University College London Institute of Neurology, leads a research team whose work could ultimately lead to the repair of spinal cord injuries in humans. An estimated 40,000 people in the UK live with spinal cord injuries. His team’s work offers significant hope that such patients will eventually be able to regain much lost movement.

For paraplegic patients – those with impairment of the functions of the lower body – this could lead to a return of sensation and movement to some leg muscles which could allow them to stand and move.

Tetraplegics – patients whose arms are also affected – might be able to recover touch sensation, movement of the hands and the ability to dress, feed and clean themselves.

Raisman’s key discovery was that there is one part of the nervous system – nerve fibres in the nasal cavity – that continually renews itself. If his experimental work with rats can be replicated with humans then patients could become their own cell donors.

In the next year or two the team is hoping to conduct a preliminary safety trial of the technique at the National Hospital of Neurology and Neurosurgery in London. Initially they will use nasal cells to try to repair nerves torn out of the spinal cord in motor bike accidents. “In the long run,” he says, “We hope this will get people out of wheelchairs.”