The major aim of this proposal is to exploit the endogenous potential of brain self-repair to improve recovery of tissue and function after stroke.

Questions to be answered by the project:

(1) if both ischemia and antidepressants stimulate neurogenesis, does antidepressant treatment provide benefit beyond that afforded by ischemia itself?

(2) does the rodent brain environment support the migration and neuronal differentiation of newly generated post-stroke neurons?

By this measure we expect to develop a pre-clinical protocol of improved post-stroke recovery based on enhancement of the endogeneous neurogenesis in aged animal models.