Brain network plasticity and verbal memory outcomes following temporal lobe resection

Unlike your bones or your skin, if you hurt your brain, it does not grow back. Despite that fact, people with brain injuries are sometimes able to recover the capacity to think, speak, and move, even though the parts of the brain responsible for those abilities were damaged or destroyed. Scientists believe that people can do this because the brain reorganizes itself, but how that reorganization happens is not understood. My research helps to answer that question by looking at how the brain networks of patients with epilepsy change after brain surgery and how those changes relate to patients’ abilities to learn and remember verbal information. Once we understand the reorganization that happens during recovery and how it affects the way people think and behave, we will hopefully be able to apply that knowledge toward creating targeted treatments for people who are recovering from brain injuries, such as concussion and stroke, to help them reach the best possible outcome.