temporal lobe, premotor regions/posterior inferior frontal gyrus. and the primary motor cortex. In a study which enrolled patients in a speech therapy program, an increase in AF fibers and volume was found in patients after 6-weeks in the program which correlated with long-term improvement in those patients. The results of the experiment are pictured in Figure 2. This implies that DTI can be used to quantify the improvement in patients after speech and language treatment programs are applied. Conclusion Neuroimaging tools serve as a useful method for determining disorder progression, quantification of cortical damage, aphasia subtype, treatment effectiveness, and differentiating diagnosis with correlated disorders. Utilization of neuroimaging tools is necessary for the progression of knowledge of aphasia and its subtypes. Further research Research is currently being done using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to witness the difference in how language is processed in normal brains vs aphasic brains. This will help researchers to understand exactly what the brain must go through in order to recover from Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) and how different areas of the brain respond after such an injury. Another intriguing approach being tested is that of drug therapy. Research is in progress that will hopefully uncover whether or not certain drugs might be used in addition to speech-language therapy in order to facilitate recovery of proper language function. It's possible that the best treatment for Aphasia might involve combining drug treatment with therapy, instead of relying on one over the other. One other method being researched as a potential therapeutic combination with speech-language therapy is brain stimulation. One particular method, Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS), alters brain activity in whatever area it happens to stimulate, which has recently led scientists to wonder if this shift in brain function caused by TMS might help people re-learn languages. The research being put into Aphasia has only just begun. Researchers appear to have multiple ideas on how Aphasia could be more effectively treated in the future. See also Agnosia, inability to process sensory information (e.g. inability to recognize objects) Aphasiology, study of language impairment (usually from brain damage) Apraxia of speech, difficulty connecting speech messages from the brain to the mouth Aprosodia Auditory processing disorder Lethologica Lists of language disorders My Beautiful Broken Brain, a 2014 documentary Origin of speech References External links National Aphasia Association Alexia (condition) Communication disorders Language disorders Symptoms and signs: Speech and voice