Neural circuits related to language exhibit a remarkable ability to reorganize and adapt in response to visual deprivation. Particularly, early and late blindness induce distinct neuroplastic changes in the visual cortex, repurposing it for language and semantic processing. Interestingly, these functional changes provoke a unique cognitive advantage – enhanced verbal working memory, particularly in early blindness. Yet, the underlying neuromechanisms and the impact on language and memory-related circuits remain not fully understood. Here, we applied a brain-constrained neural network mimicking the structural and functional features of the frontotemporal-occipital cortices, to model conceptual acquisition in early and late blindness. The results revealed differential expansion of conceptual-related neural circuits into deprived visual areas depending on the timing of visual loss, which is most prominent in early blindness. This neural recruitment is fundamentally governed by the biological principles of neural circuit expansion and the absence of uncorrelated sensory input. Critically, the degree of these changes is constrained by the availability of neural matter previously allocated to visual experiences, as in the case of late blindness. Moreover, we shed light on the implication of visual deprivation on the neural underpinnings of verbal working memory, revealing longer reverberatory neural activity in ‘blind models’ as compared to the sighted ones. These findings provide a better understanding of the interplay between visual deprivations, neuroplasticity, language processing and verbal working memory.

中文翻译：

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早期和晚期失明对语言和言语工作记忆的影响：大脑约束的神经模型

与语言相关的神经回路表现出非凡的重组和适应视觉剥夺的能力。特别是，早期失明和晚期失明会导致视觉皮层发生明显的神经塑性变化，从而将其重新用于语言和语义处理。有趣的是，这些功能变化激发了独特的认知优势——增强言语工作记忆，特别是在早期失明的情况下。然而，潜在的神经机制以及对语言和记忆相关回路的影响仍未完全了解。在这里，我们应用模拟额颞枕皮质结构和功能特征的大脑约束神经网络来模拟早期和晚期失明的概念获取。结果显示，根据视力丧失的时间，概念相关的神经回路向视觉剥夺区域的差异性扩展，这在早期失明中最为突出。这种神经募集从根本上受神经回路扩张的生物学原理和不相关的感觉输入的影响。至关重要的是，这些变化的程度受到先前分配给视觉体验的神经物质的可用性的限制，就像晚期失明的情况一样。此外，我们阐明了视觉剥夺对言语工作记忆的神经基础的影响，揭示了与视力正常的模型相比，“盲人模型”中的回响神经活动更长。这些发现让人们更好地理解视觉剥夺、神经可塑性、语言处理和言语工作记忆之间的相互作用。