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Updated: Jun 18, 2026

Investigations on Alterations of Hippocampal Circuit Function Following Mild Traumatic Brain Injury
Published on: November 19, 2012
Recovery of consciousness after brain injury: a mesocircuit hypothesis
1Department of Neurology and Neuroscience, Weill Cornell Medical College, New York, NY, USA. nds2001@med.cornell.edu
Abstract:
Recovery of consciousness following severe brain injuries can occur over long time intervals. Importantly, evolving cognitive recovery can be strongly dissociated from motor recovery in some individuals, resulting in underestimation of cognitive capacities. Common mechanisms of cerebral dysfunction that arise at the neuronal population level may explain slow functional recoveries from severe brain injuries. This review proposes a "mesocircuit" model that predicts specific roles for different structural and dynamic changes that may occur gradually during recovery. Recent functional neuroimaging studies that operationally identify varying levels of awareness, memory and other higher brain functions in patients with no behavioral evidence of these cognitive capacities are discussed. Measuring evolving changes in underlying brain function and dynamics post-injury and post-treatment frames future investigative work.
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