Cortical propagation tracks functional recovery after stroke.

Stroke is a debilitating condition affecting millions of people worldwide. The development of improved rehabilitation therapies rests on finding biomarkers suitable for tracking functional damage and recovery. To achieve this goal, we perform a spatiotemporal analysis of cortical activity obtained b...

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Main Authors: Gloria Cecchini, Alessandro Scaglione, Anna Letizia Allegra Mascaro, Curzio Checcucci, Emilia Conti, Ihusan Adam, Duccio Fanelli, Roberto Livi, Francesco Saverio Pavone, Thomas Kreuz
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Public Library of Science (PLoS) 2021-05-01
Series:PLoS Computational Biology
Online Access:https://journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1008963&type=printable
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author Gloria Cecchini
Alessandro Scaglione
Anna Letizia Allegra Mascaro
Curzio Checcucci
Emilia Conti
Ihusan Adam
Duccio Fanelli
Roberto Livi
Francesco Saverio Pavone
Thomas Kreuz
author_facet Gloria Cecchini
Alessandro Scaglione
Anna Letizia Allegra Mascaro
Curzio Checcucci
Emilia Conti
Ihusan Adam
Duccio Fanelli
Roberto Livi
Francesco Saverio Pavone
Thomas Kreuz
author_sort Gloria Cecchini
collection DOAJ
description Stroke is a debilitating condition affecting millions of people worldwide. The development of improved rehabilitation therapies rests on finding biomarkers suitable for tracking functional damage and recovery. To achieve this goal, we perform a spatiotemporal analysis of cortical activity obtained by wide-field calcium images in mice before and after stroke. We compare spontaneous recovery with three different post-stroke rehabilitation paradigms, motor training alone, pharmacological contralesional inactivation and both combined. We identify three novel indicators that are able to track how movement-evoked global activation patterns are impaired by stroke and evolve during rehabilitation: the duration, the smoothness, and the angle of individual propagation events. Results show that, compared to pre-stroke conditions, propagation of cortical activity in the subacute phase right after stroke is slowed down and more irregular. When comparing rehabilitation paradigms, we find that mice treated with both motor training and pharmacological intervention, the only group associated with generalized recovery, manifest new propagation patterns, that are even faster and smoother than before the stroke. In conclusion, our new spatiotemporal propagation indicators could represent promising biomarkers that are able to uncover neural correlates not only of motor deficits caused by stroke but also of functional recovery during rehabilitation. In turn, these insights could pave the way towards more targeted post-stroke therapies.
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spelling doaj-art-766cd56b70f84e5aa949c0380a0c8dcc2025-08-20T02:01:04ZengPublic Library of Science (PLoS)PLoS Computational Biology1553-734X1553-73582021-05-01175e100896310.1371/journal.pcbi.1008963Cortical propagation tracks functional recovery after stroke.Gloria CecchiniAlessandro ScaglioneAnna Letizia Allegra MascaroCurzio CheccucciEmilia ContiIhusan AdamDuccio FanelliRoberto LiviFrancesco Saverio PavoneThomas KreuzStroke is a debilitating condition affecting millions of people worldwide. The development of improved rehabilitation therapies rests on finding biomarkers suitable for tracking functional damage and recovery. To achieve this goal, we perform a spatiotemporal analysis of cortical activity obtained by wide-field calcium images in mice before and after stroke. We compare spontaneous recovery with three different post-stroke rehabilitation paradigms, motor training alone, pharmacological contralesional inactivation and both combined. We identify three novel indicators that are able to track how movement-evoked global activation patterns are impaired by stroke and evolve during rehabilitation: the duration, the smoothness, and the angle of individual propagation events. Results show that, compared to pre-stroke conditions, propagation of cortical activity in the subacute phase right after stroke is slowed down and more irregular. When comparing rehabilitation paradigms, we find that mice treated with both motor training and pharmacological intervention, the only group associated with generalized recovery, manifest new propagation patterns, that are even faster and smoother than before the stroke. In conclusion, our new spatiotemporal propagation indicators could represent promising biomarkers that are able to uncover neural correlates not only of motor deficits caused by stroke but also of functional recovery during rehabilitation. In turn, these insights could pave the way towards more targeted post-stroke therapies.https://journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1008963&type=printable
spellingShingle Gloria Cecchini
Alessandro Scaglione
Anna Letizia Allegra Mascaro
Curzio Checcucci
Emilia Conti
Ihusan Adam
Duccio Fanelli
Roberto Livi
Francesco Saverio Pavone
Thomas Kreuz
Cortical propagation tracks functional recovery after stroke.
PLoS Computational Biology
title Cortical propagation tracks functional recovery after stroke.
title_full Cortical propagation tracks functional recovery after stroke.
title_fullStr Cortical propagation tracks functional recovery after stroke.
title_full_unstemmed Cortical propagation tracks functional recovery after stroke.
title_short Cortical propagation tracks functional recovery after stroke.
title_sort cortical propagation tracks functional recovery after stroke
url https://journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1008963&type=printable
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AT emiliaconti corticalpropagationtracksfunctionalrecoveryafterstroke
AT ihusanadam corticalpropagationtracksfunctionalrecoveryafterstroke
AT ducciofanelli corticalpropagationtracksfunctionalrecoveryafterstroke
AT robertolivi corticalpropagationtracksfunctionalrecoveryafterstroke
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