Because of the spinal cord injury he suffered in an accidental shooting in 1980, U.S. Rep. James R. Langevin not only uses a wheelchair, he also has the equivalent of a broken thermostat for controlling his body temperature. But Langevin said, "As much as I hate the cold weather, I wouldn't have missed this inauguration." The Democratic congressman has been a champion of human embryonic stem cell research and with Obama sponsored the Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act of 2007. There has been debate about whether Obama should quickly issue an executive order regarding stem cell research or whether Congress should plow through a divisive debate to enact a statute. "My preference is we do both," Langevin said. Langevin hopes such research could eventually help him. But, he said, "This isn't about Jim Langevin. It's about the millions of others who can be helped."

Ricky was well on his way to fulfilling a childhood dream of becoming a Supercross champion, when life took a drastic turn. At just 16 years old, the handsome teenager was injured in a Motocross accident. The blow to his T7 vertebrae left him paralyzed from his sternum down. Today he can usually be found racing a specially engineered Motocross bike or behind the wheel of a Nascar-style truck, but a few weeks ago he also won the Hand-Cycle Class Championship in the Foster Grant Ironman World Championship 70.3 Triathlon by swimming for 2.4 miles, handcycling for 112 miles, and running a 26.2 mile marathon. "This has been an opportunity to show young people that suffer from any form of disability that, with perseverance, anything is achievable", said James. We say, "Wow!"

Monkeys taught to play a computer game were able to overcome wrist paralysis with an experimental device that might lead to new treatments for patients with stroke and spinal cord injury. Remarkably, the monkeys regained use of paralyzed muscles by learning to control the activity of just a single brain cell. The device monitored the activity of a brain cell and used that as a cue to stimulate wrist muscles electrically. Researchers found it could even use brain cells that normally had nothing to do with wrist movement, said study co-author Chet Moritz. So a large untapped pool of brain cells may be available for letting paralyzed people do things like grasping a coffee cup or brushing teeth, Moritz said. But he stressed the approach is years, if not decades, away from use in people. It is just a crack in the door, but what a door!

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