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Abstract: Savant syndrome is a rare and unusual condition that occurs in the presence of severe developmental disabilities, disorders, and injuries. The syndrome can be congenital from birth to childhood or acquired as a result of a brain injury or damage to the central nervous system. There are several findings that indicate that savant syndrome usually occurs with significant brain metabolism alterations resulting in critical brain network changes. These types of changes in the brain are usually explained by the “tyranny of the left hemisphere” theory, which indicates the inhibition of the left hemisphere to allow the right hemisphere to develop savant abilities. Another way to temporarily simulate these types of changes in the brain can be through different neuromodulation techniques such as transcranial magnetic stimulation and transcranial direct current stimulation. Such neuromodulation techniques might help us discover the “hidden talent” potential through modulating the brain network metabolism. We herein discussed the types of savant syndrome along with its relation to specific neurometabolic network alterations. Furthermore, we provide a perspective on how newly developed neuromodulation and cognitive rehabilitation techniques can help simulate savant syndrome in healthy individuals through modulating the brain network activity.

Background: Corticobasal Degeneration (CBD) is a rare neurological disease caused by the pathological accumulation of tau protein. The primary pathological features of CBD include progressive neurodegenerative processes resulting in remarkable frontoparietal and basal ganglia atrophy. Objective: Like in many other neurodegenerative disorders, there is still no effective disease-modifying drug therapy in CBD. Therefore, the development of new treatment methods is of great importance. In this study, we aimed to assess the stimulating effects of high-frequency DLPFC rTMS on the motor, cognitive and behavioral disturbances in four CBD patients. Methods: Four (three females, one male) CBD patients who had been diagnosed as CBD were enrolled in this study. Patients were evaluated before and after the rTMS procedure regarding the motor, neuropsychometric and behavioral tests. The results of statistical analysis of behavioral and neuropsychometric evaluation were assessed via SPSS 18.0 package program. Data are expressed as mean, standard deviation. Before and after values of the groups were compared with the Wilcoxon sign rank test, and p Results: We have provided strong preliminary evidence that the improvement in clinical parameters was associated with the normalizations of the theta activity and glucose metabolism. Conclusion: Our current results are consistent with some previous trials showing a strong association between DLPFC targeted rTMS and electrophysiological normalizations in the left DLPFC.

WOS: 000442221000009 PubMed ID: 29493461 Background: The causal link between upper limb restlessness and cervical disc prolapsus is still unclear, and the exact role of the spinal cord in the origination of limb restlessness is not yet completely understood. Methods: Here we have evaluated the therapeutic effect of pramipexole (0.5mg/kg) in a 47-year old male with cervical disc prolapsus who described restlessness in his upper limb and neck. Results: The patient felt significantly better, and his symptoms improved near to complete after five days when we initiated 0.5mg/day pramipexole treatment. Conclusion: In our present paper, we provide more evidence for the role of pramipexole (0.5mg/day) in limb restlessness which is associated with cervical disc herniation. In this context, we also have discussed the underlying pathophysiology which seems to be responsible for the restlessness symptoms of the patients.