Low-dose ketamine tilts the cortical excitation--inhibition balance irrespective of systemic physiological response
bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) September 21, 2026 Judith Kunze, Justus Student, Sarah Tune et al. preprint
Non-invasive proxies of cortical excitation--inhibition (E:I) balance, are increasingly used to understand human neural dynamics; especially so the aperiodic (1/f) electroencephalographic (EEG) exponent. Ketamine, an NMDA-receptor antagonist, is thought to shift this balance toward excitation. Propofol, a GABAA-receptor agonist, should behave oppositely. Here we show that these pharmacological...