The Functional Architecture of the Left Posterior and Lateral Prefrontal Cortex in Humans

The anatomical and functional organization of the lateral prefrontal cortex (LPFC) is one of the most debated issues in cognitive and integrative neurosciences. The aim of this study is to determine whether the human LPFC is organized according to the domain of information, to the level of the processing or to both of these dimensions. In order to clarify this issue, we have designed an experimental protocol that combines a functional magnetic resonance imaging study in healthy subjects (n 5 12) and a voxel-by-voxel lesion mapping study in patients with focal prefrontal lesions (n5 37) compared with normal controls (n5 48). Each method used the same original cognitive paradigm (‘‘the domain n-back tasks’’) that tests by a cross-dimensional method the domain of information (verbal, spatial, faces) and the level of processing (from 1- to 3-back). Converging data from the 2 methods demonstrate that the left posterior LPFC is critical for the highe