Functional Resilience of the Neural Visual Recognition System Post-Pediatric Occipitotemporal Resection.

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Developmental Neuroscience
• Cognitive Neuroscience

Background:

• Neural representations for visual categories develop in the occipitotemporal cortex (OTC) across both brain hemispheres.
• The necessity of bilateral OTC for visual recognition and the emergence of neural representations remains unclear.

Approach:

• Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was used to map category selectivity (CS) and neural representations via repetition suppression (RS).
• Pediatric patients with unilateral OTC resection, controls with extra-OTC resections, and typically developing individuals were studied.
• Multivariate and univariate analyses assessed neural activation patterns for faces, objects, and words.

Key Points:

• No significant differences in CS or RS magnitude were found between groups in neural activation patterns.
• OTC resection patients showed impaired face and object recognition accuracy compared to controls.
• Neural representations in the preserved hemisphere of OTC patients were comparable to controls.

Conclusions:

• The brain exhibits remarkable neural plasticity and resilience following unilateral OTC resection in childhood.
• A single OTC hemisphere is insufficient for normal visual recognition behavior, underscoring the necessity of bilateral OTC function.
• Hemispheric collaboration between the two OTCs is critical for refined visual recognition skills.