Recovery potentials following CNS lesions: a brief historical perspective in relation to modern research data on neuroplasticity.

This article begins with a brief historical account of our attempts to understand the brain by endlessly mapping out discrete structural and functional territories. These territorial or classical maps are then contrasted with the new metabolic maps, which show brain function and plasticity as it has never been conceptualized or visualized before. The new maps, along with more recent research in such areas as neuroplasticity, synaptogenesis, parallel processing, holistic brain functioning, sexual dimorphism, and individual differences, are giving our profession a solid scientific foundation on which to base many of the rehabilitation techniques used today in pediatrics, geriatrics, psychiatry, and physical disabilities.