PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Anna Letizia Allegra Mascaro
AU  - Emilia Conti
AU  - Stefano Lai
AU  - Antonino Paolo Di Giovanna
AU  - Cristina Spalletti
AU  - Claudia Alia
AU  - Alessandro Panarese
AU  - Alessandro Scaglione
AU  - Leonardo Sacconi
AU  - Silvestro Micera
AU  - Matteo Caleo
AU  - Francesco Saverio Pavone
TI  - Rehabilitation promotes the recovery of structural and functional features of healthy neuronal networks after stroke
AID  - 10.1101/582775
DP  - 2019 Jan 01
TA  - bioRxiv
PG  - 582775
4099  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2019/03/20/582775.short
4100  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2019/03/20/582775.full
AB  - Rehabilitation is the most effective treatment for promoting the recovery of motor deficits after stroke. One of the most challenging experimental goals is to unambiguously link brain rewiring to motor recovery prompted by rehabilitative therapy. Here, we investigated which aspects of cortical remodeling are induced by rehabilitation by combining optical imaging and manipulation tools in a mouse model of stroke. We revealed that the stabilization of peri-infarct synaptic contacts fostered by rehabilitation goes along with increased vascular density induced by angiogenesis. Furthermore, we showed the progressive formation of a new motor representation in the peri-infarct area where temporal and spatial features of cortical activation recovered towards pre-stroke condition. In the same animals we observed the reinforcement of inter-hemispheric connectivity after rehabilitation. The present work provides the first evidences that rehabilitation promotes the combined recovery of structural and functional features distinctive of healthy neuronal networks.