A 65-year-old male with an old cerebral contusion in the frontal lobes had suffered from status complex partial seizures. Ictal positron emission tomography with an F-18 fluorodeoxyglucose ([18F]FDG-PET) scan revealed hypermetabolism in the frontal, temporal and parietal lobes and the contralateral cerebellar hemisphere. The patient underwent a next-day PET scan with the 15O-labeled gas inhalat...

INTRODUCTION Although it has been speculated for many years that the prefrontal cortex plays a role in long-term memory for events, or episodic memory, only recently have researchers made a concerted attempt to define this role. Most theories of prefrontal function suggest that this region implements " top-down " or " executive " processes that influence a variety of domains, including memory. ...

This chapter addresses the assessment of functions related to the prefrontal region within frontal lobes. It is proposed in this chapter that the neuropsychological assessment of the prefrontal region of the brain can be divided into four functional categories: (1) executive cognitive, (2) behavioral/emotional self-regulatory, (3) activation regulating, and (4) metacognitive processes. The gene...

Cognitive and neuroscience studies indicate that attentional operations are impaired in Alzheimer's disease (AD). Our goal was to define the anatomical areas of activation associated with visual attention processing and to define deficits or changes that may occur in AD patients compared with control group. Thirteen AD patients and 13 age- and education-matched normal controls were tested in tw...

In order to investigate alterations in brain morphology and a possible temporal pattern of neuroanatomical abnormalities in the gray matter (GM), white matter (WM) and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) of young patients with Down syndrome (DS), high-resolution magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) voxel-based morphometry (VBM) was performed on 21 children and adolescents with this chromosomal aberration and...

The greater expansion of the frontal lobes along the phylogeny scale has been interpreted as the signature of evolutionary changes underlying higher cognitive abilities in humans functions in humans. However, it is unknown how an increase in number of gyri, sulci and cortical areas in the frontal lobe have coincided with a parallel increase in connectivity. Here, using advanced tractography bas...