Exercise increased the response magnitude of cells in the forelimb somatosensory cortex to forelimb stimulation in spinalized rats. A. Examples of peri-stimulus time histograms showing the responses of four cells recorded simultaneously from each of three stimulus locations: forepaw digit 2 (FD2), forepaw palm pad 5 (FPL5) and forelimb (FL). B. The average response magnitude of infragranular cells within the forelimb somatosensory cortex of exercised spinalized rats (1.49±0.07 spikes/stimulus, # of rats = 5) was greater than that of normal rats (0.626±0.001 spikes/stimulus, # of rats = 4), ***p<0.001. C. There was no difference in the first bin latency of cortical forelimb cells of the exercised spinalized rats (17±0.02 msec) when compared with the first bin latency from the normals (18±0.47 msec). There was an increase in the last bin latency of the response of cortical cells in the exercised spinalized rats (48±0.94 msec)when compared with that of the normals (39±0.05 msec), ***p<0.001.