Narrator: This is Science Today. Neuroscientists and engineers are working on developing ‘smart' neural prosthetic devices, which are intended to restore function through electrical stimulation to damaged motor neural circuits. Dr. Mike Merzenich of the University of California , San Francisco, says a smart neural prosthesis would take advantage of the brain's natural plasticity – that is, its capacity to change.

Merzenich: We have an amazing adaptive machine, which will actually reorganize itself to get the most out of a prosthetic device that's appropriately designed as a smart device so that we get a consistently good outcome from it. That's what it does when it actually controls our real bodies and that's what it can do when it controls the prosthetic.

Narrator: Merzenich, a pioneer in brain plasticity research, is currently working on developing intensive mental and physical training programs to encourage the brain to rewire itself to help patients with schizophrenia or those with functional losses due to normal aging.

Merzenich: To what extent can we drive the individual's brain back in a corrective direction?

Narrator: For Science Today, I'm Larissa Branin.