Mirror neuron system as the joint from action to language.

Mirror neuron system (MNS) represents one of the most important discoveries of cognitive neuroscience in the past decade, and it has been found to involve in multiple aspects of brain functions including action understanding, imitation, language understanding, empathy, action prediction and speech evolution. This manuscript reviewed the function of MNS in action understanding as well as language evolution, and specifically assessed its roles as the bridge from body language to fluent speeches. Then we discussed the speech defects of autism patients due to the disruption of MNS. Finally, given that MNS is plastic in adult brain, we proposed MNS targeted therapy provides an efficient rehabilitation approach for brain damages conditions as well as autism patients.

Chen W, Yuan TF. Department of Psychology; Institute of Cognition and Behavioral Neuroscience, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou 310018, China; Department of Anatomy, The University of Hong Kong, Li Kai Shing Faculty of Medicine, Hong Kong; E-mail: yuantf@hku.hk. Neurosci Bull. 2008 Aug;24(4):259-64.