Brain’s Body Map Remains Stable Even After Limb Loss

Rapid Summary

• A new neuroscience study published in Nature Neuroscience challenges the longstanding belief that the brain reorganizes its body map following limb amputation.
• researchers found that the primary somatosensory cortex,responsible for mapping sensory facts,remains stable even years after an arm amputation.
• Using fMRI imaging over a five-year period with pre- and post-amputation participants, researchers observed activation patterns in cortical areas associated with the missing hand remained unchanged.
• The study also refutes previous findings that suggest neighboring neurons would redistribute to take over unused regions of the cortex after amputation.
• Senior author Tamar Makin from Cambridge University reiterated this finding coudl impact treatments for phantom limb pain and enhance prosthetics or brain-computer interfaces controlled by neural signals.
• Study methods included measuring pre-surgery motor tasks (e.g., finger tapping) followed by repeat testing using “phantom fingers” post-surgery.
• Scientists noted such stability might explain low success rates in therapies targeting cortical reorganization as a root cause of phantom limb pain.

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