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The fame of Paul Broca as a precursor of cognitive neuroscience is mainly due to his groundbreaking work in describing brain lesions, most notably patient Leborgne’s speech disorder, and the correlation he drew with the left inferior frontal lesion that caused it, in a region known ever since as Broca’s area.1 Based on further cases of aphasia, he was also able to elucidate the left hemisphere’s systematic specialisation for language. Less recognised is his pioneering interest for in vivo brain imaging. He used measures of scalp temperature for the early diagnosis of brain lesions, as well as for functional imaging in normal subjects, which are today the two main applications of techniques such as magnetic resonance imaging.2 His imaging ideas were inspired from studies at the time that measured skin temperature to infer the localisation and mechanism of arterial lesions of the limbs, and to guide amputation whenever necessary.
In order to apply this approach …