Plasticity and the Human Brain: Insights from Functional Imaging

This article begins with a definition of cerebral plasticity in human brain that rests on the concept of a long-term alteration in patterns of task- or behavior-related activity in distributed brain systems. The theme is then developed to show how such a concept and the mechanisms it implies can be investigated and mapped using modern noninvasive functional imaging techniques. The human experimental literature is critically presented in relation to normal behavior, especially in relation to the acquisition of motor skills and learning. A discussion of the functional reorganization that follows brain injury and that is associated with spontaneous recovery from motor and perceptual deficits is then presented from the perspective of understanding the brain mechanisms at the level of large-scale neuronal populations.