fMRI on Brain Tumor

• Language networks in patients with primary brain tumor.

 

 Patients with brain tumor or lesion are known to exhibit language deficits. Our laboratory investigates behavioral performance as well as cortical activation patterns while picture-naming, in patients with left frontal lobe tumor prior to surgery.

 

Picture naming is an elementary process in the use of language and requires the production of speech sounds associated with a visual stimulus. It involves distinct cognitive processes—visual identification of a known concept, lexical retrieval, access to the phonological word form and motor articulation (Rodriguez-Fornells et al. 2002). Evidence from a large number of neuroimaging studies reveals a reliable naming network comprising of bilateral occipital gyri, left inferior frontal gyrus, fusiform gyrus, right cerebellum, right insular and left superior temporal gyrus (Hillis et al. 2006; Indefrey and Levelt 2004; Price et al. 2005; Whatmough et al. 2002). The development of an intraparenchymal brain tumor or brain lesion in any of the above mentioned cortical areas might disrupt the process of naming pictures.

 

 Publications

1. Picture-naming in patients with left frontal lobe tumor - a functional neuroimaging study, A. Chakraborty & T. A. Sumathi & V. S. Mehta & N. C. Singh, Brain Imaging and Behavior DOI 10.1007/s11682-012-9165-4 (2012).