Michel Thiebaut de Schotten (IoP, London)

Looking for a friend in the crowd or avoiding a sudden danger are two actions based on the quality of our visuo-spatial attention. Behavioural tests and brain imaging technology demonstrated that visuo-spatial attention is a specialized function of the right hemisphere of the brain. However, anatomical features supporting this specialization have remained elusive. We scanned volunteers with a novel brain imaging technology that can depict the white matter connections, and we measured the degree of specialization of the right hemisphere for visuo-spatial attention with behavioural tests. Exploring the brain circuits, we found white matter connections whose size predicts the degree of specialization of the right hemisphere for visuo-spatial attention. This lateralization may be predictive of visuo-spatial recovery in patients with lesions of parieto-frontal networks.