Affiliations: University Campus Bio-Medico, Roma, Italy
Note: [] Corresponding author: Gloria Dal Forno, MD, PhD, University
Campus BioMedico, Via Emilio Longoni 83, Roma 00155, Italy. Tel.: +39 06
225411; Fax: +39 06 22541602; E-mail: g.dalforno@unicampus.it
Abstract: Contrary to what previously believed, recent research advances have
demonstrated that the adult brain has a certain capacity for plastic
reorganization and self-repair after a lesion such as cerebrovascular
accidents. The mechanisms subtending post-stroke recovery are probably complex
and operating at different levels, from molecular to synaptic to anatomical
reorganization. The integrated use of functional neuroimaging techniques, by
overcoming the limitations of each specific methodology is likely to shed much
light on plasticity mechanisms. In this review we discuss the neuroanatomy and
neurophysiology possibly underlying reorganization of the central nervous
system, as well as the experimental evidence of "in vivo" post-stroke
plasticity. Better understanding of these mechanisms can provide
neurorehabilitation with powerful tools in designing and implementing new
therapeutic approaches to stroke patients both in the acute and the chronic
stages after a brain tissue lesion has occurred and stabilized.
Keywords: plasticity, post-stroke recovery, integrated functional neuroimaging, TMS, MEG
