Carnegie Mellon, Pitt Team Show That Adult Brains Compensate For Damage To Language Systems After Str...( at about the same time as the patients...),Health

In healthy brains, language functions are carried out by a network of mirror image brain areas in the left and right side of the brain, with one side, usually the left, being dominant. The subordinate side, usually the right, may spend most of its lifetime playing an understudy role, as well as developing its own specializations.

But if a stroke or some other neurological damage disables one of the network components on the dominant side, the corresponding left side component rapidly and spontaneously emerges from its understudy role, and starts to activate to a normally high level during language processing.

The rapid recovery of the ability to use language after stroke damage to the language network was previously attributed to tissue healing functions, like reduction of swelling in the brain.

Researchers say the new results show that part of the recovery is due to the brain function reorganization, a re-balancing of the network, like the cast of a play adjusting to the loss of a key actor. The adjustment can begin within a day or two after the stroke, and can continue for many months.

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Contact: Marcel Just
just+@andrew.cmu.edu
412-268-2791
Carnegie Mellon University
20-Apr-1999