Rats were anesthetized through an intramuscular injection of tiletamine hydrochloride (60 mg/kg) into the thigh muscle and fixed to the prone position with a stereotaxic instrument (Model 900 Small Animal Stereotaxic Instrument; David Kopf Instruments, Tujunga, CA, USA). A Homeothermic pad (Homeothermic Blanket System; Harvard Apparatus Ltd., Edenbridge, Kent, UK) maintained the body temperature at 37.0°C±0.5°C. For inducing the brain injury, we applied the weight drop model instrument modified by Feeney et al. [10 (link)], adapting the method of Ducker [11 ] to induce a spinal cord injury. The protocol we followed was suggested by Yoon et al. [12 (link)] for inducing a moderate brain injury in rats (Fig. 1). The impact point was 1.0 mm anterior and 3.0 mm lateral to the bregma, which was the contralateral side of the dominant forelimb referred to on a rat brain map [13 ]. Above the impact point, an incision of 2.5 cm on the scalp was cut and after a circular craniotomy (d=3 mm) the dura mater was dissected and the cortical impact lesion was induced by dropping a round piece of brass with cross-sectional diameter of 2 mm onto the rat’s brain.