Neuroscience of Consciousness
2026
Bianca Ventura, Andrea Buccellato, Saketh Malipeddi et al.
Different forms of meditation, like Vipassana and Shoonya, require distinct attentional features. For instance, Vipassana, which involves systematically scanning different body parts, may demand a sustained yet dynamic focus with a temporally stable and regular attentional emphasis. In contrast, Shoonya meditation has been described as involving a non-directed or defocused attentional stance,...
Computers in biology and medicine
October 1, 2025
Andrea Buccellato, Di Zang, Yasir Çatal et al.
The brain displays intrinsic durations in its own spontaneous activity - Intrinsic Neural Timescales (INTs). INTs are hierarchically organized, with shorter durations within unimodal regions and longer intervals in multimodal domains. Despite significant progress, it's currently not known whether the unimodal-multimodal hierarchical organization undergoes recurrent changes itself - consistent...
Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences
June 1, 2025
Georg Northoff, Andrea Buccellato, Bianca Ventura
The default mode network (DMN) exhibits distinct dynamic and topographic features relative to the brain’s other networks, yet their link to consciousness remains unclear. We review both neural (DMN-based topography and dynamics) and mental (experience of time speed, mental time travel, and self-non-self) findings across diverse nonordinary states of consciousness, including reduced (anesthesia,...
Physics of Life Reviews
March 1, 2025
Georg Northoff, Andrea Buccellato, Federico Zilio
31 citations
Despite major progress in our understanding of the brain, the connection of neural and mental features, that is, brain and mind, remains yet elusive. In our 2020 target paper ("Is temporospatial dynamics the 'common currency' of brain and mind? Spatiotemporal Neuroscience") we proposed the "Common currency hypothesis": temporo-spatial dynamics are shared by neural and mental features, providing...
Neuroimage
August 15, 2024
Bianca Ventura, Yasir Çatal, Angelika Wolman et al.
22 citations
Meditation encompasses a range of practices employing diverse induction techniques, each characterized by a distinct attentional focus. In Mantra meditation, for instance, practitioners direct their attention narrowly to a given sentence that is recursively repeated, while other forms of meditation such as Shoonya meditation are induced by a wider attentional focus. Here we aimed to identify...