Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Preface
- 1 The nature and mechanisms of plasticity
- 2 Techniques of transcranial magnetic stimulation
- 3 Developmental plasticity of the corticospinal system
- 4 Practice-induced plasticity in the human motor cortex
- 5 Skill learning
- 6 Stimulation-induced plasticity in the human motor cortex
- 7 Lesions of cortex and post-stroke ‘plastic’ reorganization
- 8 Lesions of the periphery and spinal cord
- 9 Functional relevance of cortical plasticity
- 10 Therapeutic uses of rTMS
- 11 Rehabilitation
- 12 New questions
- Index
- Plate section
- References
12 - New questions
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 August 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Preface
- 1 The nature and mechanisms of plasticity
- 2 Techniques of transcranial magnetic stimulation
- 3 Developmental plasticity of the corticospinal system
- 4 Practice-induced plasticity in the human motor cortex
- 5 Skill learning
- 6 Stimulation-induced plasticity in the human motor cortex
- 7 Lesions of cortex and post-stroke ‘plastic’ reorganization
- 8 Lesions of the periphery and spinal cord
- 9 Functional relevance of cortical plasticity
- 10 Therapeutic uses of rTMS
- 11 Rehabilitation
- 12 New questions
- Index
- Plate section
- References
Summary
The future is ever a misted landscape, no man foreknows it, but at cyclical turns There is a change felt in the rhythm of events
robinson jeffers Prescription of Painful Ends (l. 3–4). Oxford Book of American Verse, The. F.O. Matthiessen, ed. (1950) Oxford University Press.The 1990s have witnessed a dramatic burst of knowledge about plasticity. Understanding the importance of plasticity and mechanisms of plasticity and the use of transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) as a tool to study human biology have developed at about the same time. It is clear from this book that contributions from TMS studies to plasticity have been enormous. What are the prospects for the future? It is impossible to know exactly what will happen. Simple extrapolations from what is happening now are relatively obvious, and to some extent have been noted in the earlier chapters. There may be new discoveries that will change directions.
It is clear that TMS will not be the only tool to study plasticity, many different techniques will play a role in both basic science and human investigations. For human studies, neuroimaging is very powerful, and EEG and MEG will likely play a greater role to improve time resolution. TMS will likely continue to be used to study the physiology of plasticity, but the bigger growth area may well be in the use of TMS to influence plasticity. Such uses may well expand to therapeutics. These are the topics that we will consider in some more detail.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Plasticity in the Human Nervous SystemInvestigations with Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation, pp. 288 - 300Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2003