Experience-driven Competition in Neural Reorganization After Stroke

Abstract

Stroke instigates a prolonged period of neuroanatomical reorganization that is extraordinarily sensitive to behavioral experience. This talk focuses on findings from rodent stroke models that support critical roles for experience in shaping this process of reorganization. Behavioral interventions, such as rehabilitative training, can interact with regenerative responses to drive brain reorganization in functionally beneficial directions. However, "self-taught" compensatory behaviors may normally dominate experience-driven patterns of reorganization, and they can drive neural reorganization patterns that are suboptimal for outcome and competitive with those mediating rehabilitative training efficacy.