Study Shows Brain Keeps Internal Body Map Intact After Amputation

Brain Map Explains Phantom Limb Pain, Hints At Improved Prosthetics

Key Takeaways

Study shows brain keeps internal body map intact after amputation

Researchers tracked brain activity before and after arm amputation and found that hand and lip maps in the cortex remained remarkably stable for up to five years. This challenges decades-old assumptions of large-scale remapping and supports the idea of a resilient internal body model.

MRI shows how the brain maintains 'representation' of phantom limbs

"The brain's control center for a lost appendage can persist long after surgical amputation," researchers say.

Amputation does not rewrite the body map in the brain – The Observatorial

Researchers from the University of Cambridge, the University College of London and the University of Pittsburgh found that after removing the limb, the body map in the brain remains unchanged. These conclusions, published in Nature Neuroscience, refute the previous ideas about the restructuring of the brain and can affect new approaches to the treatment of […]