Interview: Prof. Hillel Chiel,
Case Western Reserve University

SUGGESTED INTRO: THE SIMPLE NEUROMUSCULAR SYSTEM OF CALIFORNIA SEA SLUGS IS GIVING RESEARCHERS NEW INSIGHT INTO HOW OUR OWN BRAIN AND MUSCLES WORK TOGETHER. WHAT THEY LEARN COULD SOME DAY HELP VICTIMS OF PARALYSIS REGAIN MOVEMENT. HERE'S A REPORT:

VIDEO: Open with CU of sea slug in water tank in Hillel Chiel's lab at CWRU. Cut to med shot of sea slug in tank with tilt-up to shot of Chiel. Cut back to ECU of sea slug eating seaweed pasta strand. Cut back to CU of Chiel.

Cut to shot of formerly paralyzed patient, walking with aid of functional electrical stimulation implants.

Cut to FES patient lifting objects with hand.

VOICEOVER: YOU WOULDN'T THINK A SEA SLUG COULD BE SO BUSY, BUT SEA SLUGS IN HILLEL CHIEL'S LAB AT CASE WESTERN RESERVE UNIVERSITY ARE HARD AT WORK -- EATING SEAWEED PASTA. THAT'S ALRIGHT WITH CHIEL BECAUSE IT HELPS HIM OBSERVE THE NEURO-MUSCULAR ACTIVITY INVOLVED IN EATING. BY OBSERVING THE SIMPLE SLUG ANIMAL, WHICH HAS EASILY TRACEABLE NEURONS, CHIEL CAN APPLY WHAT HE LEARNS TO HUMAN NEURAL NETWORKS LIKE THOSE BEING DEVELOPED AT CASE WESTERN RESERVE'S FUNCTIONAL ELECTRICAL STIMULATION CENTER, HELPING PARALYZED PATIENTS TO WALK AND LIFT OBJECTS.

SOT & SUGGESTED SUPER:
Prof. Hillel Chiel, Case Western Reserve University

Cut to side-by-side live transparent view of sea slug feeding.

Cut back to Chiel on-camera.

Cut to CU of sea slug feeding on seaweed pasta.

Cut back to Chiel on-camera.

INTERVIEW: We have 10 billion neurons in each of our brains. The sea slug has about 20,000 neurons, and they're large and they're colored and you can in each animal find the same neuron over and over again. So you can actually work out the circuitry in great detail. The things that we've done most recently are using MRI techniques. We've been able to actually image the animal as it feeds and that's really very cool because then you can actually as it were, look inside of the behaving animal and see what it's doing as it's doing it. To do the MRI studies we needed the slug to be feeding for minutes before we got it all ready, so what we decided to do was to create something that the slug would really love to eat and would just focus on to the exclusion of everything else, and that's what gave rise to the idea of the seaweed pasta. (TRT :49)

VIDEO: Cut to CU of sea slug feeding. FX to still shot of diagram of proposed parastaltic endoscope. FX to CWRU M.D. using current endoscope (CU endoscope controls, M.D.'s face, endoscope video monitor.)

VOICEOVER: CHIEL ALSO APPLIES HIS SEA SLUG RESEARCH TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF TOMORROW'S MINIMALLY INVASIVE MEDICAL AND SURGICAL DEVICES. HE'S COLLABORATING WITH MEDICAL RESEARCHERS TO DEVELOP A LOW-TRAUMA ENDOSCOPE.

ON-CAMERA INTERVIEW:
Prof. Hillel Chiel, Case Western Reserve University

Cut to shots of CWRU robot demonstrating forward movement. FX to top view and reverse view.

INTERVIEW: One of the things that's a very big area now is minimally invasive surgery, where people are trying to develop novel tools that can go into patients and do minimal damage and see what's going on and help fix them. If you could take the ideas about the slug body and create a hydrostatic endoscope that could actually move parastaltically forward, then you could take the physician out of the business of pushing things in and allow him to just focus on guiding it. (TRT :31)

Cut to CU of sea slug feeding in water tank.

Cut to med shot of Chiel feeding sea slug.

Cut to black.

VOICEOVER: IF IT SEEMS LIKE A LOT OF WORK FOR A SEA SLUG TO SHOULDER, THEY'RE UP TO THE TASK. JUST PASS THE PASTA PLEASE.

THIS IS TOM SHROUT REPORTING FROM CASE WESTERN RESERVE UNIVERSITY, CLEVELAND.