Until recently, most have assumed that traumatic brain injury (TBI) was singularly associated with the overt destruction of brain tissue resulting in subsequent morbidity or death. More recently, experimental and clinical studies have shown that the pathobiology of TBI is more complex, involving a host of cellular and subcellular changes that impact on neuronal function and viability while also affecting vascular reactivity and the activation of multiple biological response pathways. Here we review the brain's response to injury, examining both focal and diffuse changes and their implications for post-traumatic brain dysfunction and recovery. TBI-induced neuronal dysfunction and death as well as the diffuse involvement of multiple fiber projections are discussed together with considerations of how local axonal membrane changes or channelopathy translate into local ionic dysregulation and axonal disconnection. Concomitant changes in the cerebral microcirculation are also discussed and their relationship with the parallel changes in the brain's metabolism is considered. These cellular and subcellular events occurring within neurons and their blood supply are correlated with multiple biological response modifiers evoked by generalized post-traumatic inflammation and the parallel activation of oxidative stress processes. The chapter closes with considerations of recovery following focal or diffuse injury. Evidence for dynamic brain reorganization/repair is presented, with considerations of traumatically induced circuit disruption and their progression to either adaptive or in some cases, maladaptive reorganization.
Keywords: CNS reorganization; cerebrovascular dysfunction; chronic degeneration; deafferentation; inflammation; neuronal and axonal injury; oxidative stress; physiological and metabolic consequences; therapeutic targeting.
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