Cortical Plasticity : A Model of Somatosensory Cortex
(2004)Cognitive Science
- Abstract
- After nerve injuries, e.g. following a reimplantation of an accidentally cut hand, nerve fibres grows together again but will be misconnected. This implies an incorrectly mapping of the hand in somatosensory cortex. However, the brain is plastic and thus a natural question is if there is a way to stimulate the hand of such a patient so that the recovery will be optimal. To come up with suggestions on this, a computational model of the
dorsal column-medial leminiscal system was implemented. Different versions of this model were used to simulate the reorganization of somatosensory cortex due to misconnected nerve fibres. A number of tactile training methods were
simulated and their capability to reorganize cortex was measured. The... (More) - After nerve injuries, e.g. following a reimplantation of an accidentally cut hand, nerve fibres grows together again but will be misconnected. This implies an incorrectly mapping of the hand in somatosensory cortex. However, the brain is plastic and thus a natural question is if there is a way to stimulate the hand of such a patient so that the recovery will be optimal. To come up with suggestions on this, a computational model of the
dorsal column-medial leminiscal system was implemented. Different versions of this model were used to simulate the reorganization of somatosensory cortex due to misconnected nerve fibres. A number of tactile training methods were
simulated and their capability to reorganize cortex was measured. The simulation results brought about the following recommendation on how to stimulate a patient's hand: Randomly select a small set of points on the palm and stimulate them shortly, and
then select some new points. This recommendation is due to that such training methods worked well in all versions of the model. When the nerve injury is only partial, perhaps so-called cortical induction would also be a good choice. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
http://lup.lub.lu.se/student-papers/record/1329029
- author
- Johnson, Magnus
- supervisor
- organization
- year
- 2004
- type
- H1 - Master's Degree (One Year)
- subject
- keywords
- numerical analysis, Computer science, neurophysiological systems, somatosensory cortex, cortical plasticity, systems, control, Datalogi, numerisk analys, system, kontroll
- language
- English
- id
- 1329029
- date added to LUP
- 2006-04-20 00:00:00
- date last changed
- 2009-04-20 11:12:24
@misc{1329029,
abstract = {{After nerve injuries, e.g. following a reimplantation of an accidentally cut hand, nerve fibres grows together again but will be misconnected. This implies an incorrectly mapping of the hand in somatosensory cortex. However, the brain is plastic and thus a natural question is if there is a way to stimulate the hand of such a patient so that the recovery will be optimal. To come up with suggestions on this, a computational model of the
dorsal column-medial leminiscal system was implemented. Different versions of this model were used to simulate the reorganization of somatosensory cortex due to misconnected nerve fibres. A number of tactile training methods were
simulated and their capability to reorganize cortex was measured. The simulation results brought about the following recommendation on how to stimulate a patient's hand: Randomly select a small set of points on the palm and stimulate them shortly, and
then select some new points. This recommendation is due to that such training methods worked well in all versions of the model. When the nerve injury is only partial, perhaps so-called cortical induction would also be a good choice.}},
author = {{Johnson, Magnus}},
language = {{eng}},
note = {{Student Paper}},
title = {{Cortical Plasticity : A Model of Somatosensory Cortex}},
year = {{2004}},
}