Yes I know. He’s adorable. They also purposely dropped weights on him to break his back. After 15 minutes of suffering they injected him with a modified version of blue number one (food coloring).
Normally this kind of trauma to the spinal cord would cause permanent paralysis due to inflammation which would cut off blood circulation to the surrounding tissue. However, this substance significantly reduces inflammation in the injured area. So our little friend here could move again after several weeks as opposed to being permanently disabled. They say the only side affects appear to be the blue skin and eyes. This goes away after a few weeks though.
I’d rather look like Doctor Manhattan for a while and move a little than being permanently disabled. They did have to kill it to analyze the spinal cord. Poor lab rat. [ national geographic]