Structural and functional brain rewiring clarifies preserved interhemispheric transfer in humans born without the corpus callosum.

ABSTRACT: Why do humans born without the corpus callosum, the major interhemispheric commissure, lack the disconnection syndrome classically described in callosotomized patients? This paradox was discovered by Nobel laureate Roger Sperry in 1968, and has remained unsolved since then. To tackle the hypothesis that alternative neural pathways could explain this puzzle, we investigated patients with callosal dysgenesis using structural and functional neuroimaging, as well as neuropsychological assessments. We identified two anomalous white-matter tracts by deterministic and probabilistic tractography, and provide supporting resting-state functional neuroimaging and neuropsychological evidence for their functional role in preserved interhemispheric transfer of complex tactile information, such as object

SUBMITTER: Tovar-Moll F 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4040546 | biostudies-literature | 2014 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature