BRAIN? seminar

Professor William Gaetz from the University of Pennsylvania visits the Faculty of Sport and Health Sciences and will give a lecture titled "Cortical Reorganization After Pediatric Bilateral Hand Transplantation: Insights using Magnetoencephalography (MEG)". 

Professor Gaetz describes the lecture contents: "In 2015, a pediatric patient underwent the first successful bilateral hand transplantation, providing a unique opportunity to study cortical reorganization following limb restoration. Using MEG, we longitudinally assessed the development of motor and somatosensory representations associated with the transplanted hands. Our findings demonstrated significant neuroplastic changes, including the emergence and strengthening of functional sensorimotor maps over time. These results highlight the brain’s capacity for integrating new peripheral inputs during childhood and offer important implications for rehabilitation and recovery strategies following complex limb transplantation."

Professor Gaetz is interested in assessing the functional significance of cortical oscillations in children using MEG. Increasingly, he is using a multimodal approach where cortical oscillations are interpreted in the context of associated structural (MRI) and molecular (MRS GABA) measures. Results from normative developmental studies are used to detail age dependent change as well as for the interpretation of clinical findings in paediatric populations such as Autism, Friedreich Ataxia and Epilepsy.