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Journal of Neuroscience

ISSN 0270-6474

67 papers in the library · 15,944 citations · publishing 1981-2025

Papers

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Neurochemical and Neurophysiological Effects of Intravenous Administration of N,N -Dimethyltryptamine in Rats

Journal of Neuroscience December 19, 2025 Nicolas G. Glynos, Emma R. Huels, Trent Groenhout et al. 11 citations

N,N-Dimethyltryptamine (DMT) is a serotonergic psychedelic that is being investigated for the treatment of psychiatric disorders. Although the neurophysiological effects of DMT in humans are well characterized, similar studies in animal models and data on the neurochemical effects of DMT are generally lacking, which are critical for a mechanistic understanding. Here, we combined behavioral...

The Psychedelic Psilocin Suppresses Activity of Central Amygdala Corticotropin-Releasing Factor Receptor 1 Neurons and Decreases Ethanol Drinking in Female Mice

Journal of Neuroscience November 10, 2025 Sarah N. Magee, Allison C. Sereno, Maria Echeveste Sanchez et al.

Alcohol use disorder (AUD) is a highly prevalent disorder with limited therapeutic options. The central amygdala (CeA) is a critical brain region as dysregulation within the CeA and the corticotropin-releasing factor (CRF) system are associated with AUD pathology. CeA CRF1 receptors regulate alcohol drinking and have served as a therapeutic target in alcohol treatment. One emerging potential...

Distinctive and Complementary Roles of Default Mode Network Subsystems in Semantic Cognition

Journal of Neuroscience April 8, 2024 Ximing Shao, Katya Krieger-Redwood, Meichao Zhang et al. 20 citations

The default mode network (DMN) typically deactivates to external tasks, yet supports semantic cognition. It comprises medial temporal (MT), core, and frontotemporal (FT) subsystems, but its functional organization is unclear: the requirement for perceptual coupling versus decoupling, input modality (visual/verbal), type of information (social/spatial), and control demands all potentially affect...

Ultrahigh Field fMRI Reveals Different Roles of the Temporal and Frontoparietal Cortices in Subjective Awareness

Journal of Neuroscience March 26, 2024 Marta Poyo Solanas, Minye Zhan, Beatrice De Gelder

A central question in consciousness theories is whether one is dealing with a dichotomous (“all-or-none”) or a gradual phenomenon. In this 7T fMRI study, we investigated whether dichotomy or gradualness in fact depends on the brain region associated with perceptual awareness reports. Both male and female human subjects performed an emotion discrimination task (fear vs neutral bodies) presented...

NMDA Receptor Activation-Dependent Antidepressant-Relevant Behavioral and Synaptic Actions of Ketamine

Journal of Neuroscience January 3, 2023 Panos Zanos, Kyle A Brown, Polymnia Georgiou et al. 109 citations

Ketamine is a well-characterized NMDA receptor (NMDAR) antagonist, although the relevance of this pharmacology to its rapid (within hours of administration) antidepressant actions, which depend on mechanisms convergent with strengthening of excitatory synapses, is unclear. Activation of synaptic NMDARs is necessary for the induction of canonical long-term potentiation (LTP) leading to a...

Neural Responses to Heartbeats Detect Residual Signs of Consciousness during Resting State in Postcomatose Patients

Journal of Neuroscience March 23, 2021 Diego Candia‐rivera, Jitka Annen, Olivia Gosseries et al. 81 citations

The neural monitoring of visceral inputs might play a role in first-person perspective (i.e., the unified viewpoint of subjective experience). In healthy participants, how the brain responds to heartbeats, measured as the heartbeat-evoked response (HER), correlates with perceptual, bodily, and self-consciousness. Here we show that HERs in resting-state EEG data distinguishes between...

Does the Prefrontal Cortex Play an Essential Role in Consciousness? Insights from Intracranial Electrical Stimulation of the Human Brain

Journal of Neuroscience March 10, 2021 Omri Raccah, Ned Block, K. Fox

A central debate in philosophy and neuroscience pertains to whether PFC activity plays an essential role in the neural basis of consciousness. Neuroimaging and electrophysiology studies have revealed that the contents of conscious perceptual experience can be successfully decoded from PFC activity, but these findings might be confounded by postperceptual cognitive processes, such as thinking,...

Hallucinogens in Mental Health: Preclinical and Clinical Studies on LSD, Psilocybin, MDMA, and Ketamine

Journal of Neuroscience November 30, 2020 Danilo de Gregorio, Argel Aguilar-Valles, Katrin H. Preller et al. 258 citations

A revamped interest in the study of hallucinogens has recently emerged, especially with regard to their potential application in the treatment of psychiatric disorders. In the last decade, a plethora of preclinical and clinical studies have confirmed the efficacy of ketamine in the treatment of depression. More recently, emerging evidence has pointed out the potential therapeutic properties of...

Duration Selectivity in Right Parietal Cortex Reflects the Subjective Experience of Time

Journal of Neuroscience September 14, 2020 Masamichi J. Hayashi, R. Ivry

The perception of duration in the subsecond range has been hypothesized to be mediated by the population response of duration-sensitive units, each tuned to a preferred duration. One line of support for this hypothesis comes from neuroimaging studies showing that cortical regions, such as in parietal cortex exhibit duration tuning. It remains unclear whether this representation is based on the...

Ketamine Affects Prediction Errors about Statistical Regularities: A Computational Single-Trial Analysis of the Mismatch Negativity

Journal of Neuroscience June 19, 2020 Lilian Weber, Andreea O. Diaconescu, Christoph Mathys et al. 82 citations

The auditory mismatch negativity (MMN) is significantly reduced in schizophrenia. Notably, a similar MMN reduction can be achieved with NMDA receptor (NMDAR) antagonists. Both phenomena have been interpreted as reflecting an impairment of predictive coding or, more generally, the "Bayesian brain" notion that the brain continuously updates a hierarchical model to infer the causes of its sensory...

Reconciling Current Theories of Consciousness

Journal of Neuroscience March 4, 2020 S. Maillé, M. Lynn 21 citations

Understanding the neural basis of consciousness is one of the fundamental challenges in modern neuroscience. A number of sophisticated models and theories have attempted to formalize how the brain implements consciousness using insights from philosophy, psychology, computer science, and neuroscience

MDMA Increases Cooperation and Recruitment of Social Brain Areas When Playing Trustworthy Players in an Iterated Prisoner's Dilemma

Journal of Neuroscience November 19, 2018 Anthony S. Gabay, Matthew J. Kempton, James Gilleen et al. 40 citations

Social decision-making is fundamental for successful functioning and can be affected in psychiatric illness and by serotoninergic modulation. The Prisoner's Dilemma is the archetypal paradigm to model cooperation and trust. However, the effect of serotonergic enhancement is poorly characterized, and its influence on the effect of variations in opponent behavior unknown. To address this, we...

Dreaming in NREM Sleep: A High-Density EEG Study of Slow Waves and Spindles

Journal of Neuroscience September 10, 2018 Francesca Siclari, Giulio Bernardi, Jacinthe Cataldi et al. 148 citations

Dreaming can occur in both rapid eye movement (REM) and non-REM (NREM) sleep. We recently showed that in both REM and NREM sleep, dreaming is associated with local decreases in slow wave activity (SWA) in posterior brain regions. To expand these findings, here we asked how specific features of slow waves and spindles, the hallmarks of NREM sleep, relate to dream experiences. Fourteen healthy...

Auditory Predictive Coding across Awareness States under Anesthesia: An Intracranial Electrophysiology Study

Journal of Neuroscience August 20, 2018 Kirill V Nourski, M. Steinschneider, A. Rhone et al.

The systems-level mechanisms underlying loss of consciousness (LOC) under anesthesia remain unclear. General anesthetics suppress sensory responses within higher-order cortex and feedback connections, both critical elements of predictive coding hypotheses of conscious perception. Responses to auditory novelty may offer promise as biomarkers for consciousness. This study examined...

Role of the 5-HT2AReceptor in Self- and Other-Initiated Social Interaction in Lysergic Acid Diethylamide-Induced States: A Pharmacological fMRI Study

Journal of Neuroscience March 19, 2018 Katrin H. Preller, Leonhard Schilbach, Thomas Pokorny et al. 75 citations

Distortions of self-experience are critical symptoms of psychiatric disorders and have detrimental effects on social interactions. In light of the immense need for improved and targeted interventions for social impairments, it is important to better understand the neurochemical substrates of social interaction abilities. We therefore investigated the pharmacological and neural correlates of...

The Longitudinal Trajectory of Default Mode Network Connectivity in Healthy Older Adults Varies As a Function of Age and Is Associated with Changes in Episodic Memory and Processing Speed

Journal of Neuroscience February 13, 2018 A. Staffaroni, Jesse A. Brown, K. Casaletto et al.

The default mode network (DMN) supports memory functioning and may be sensitive to preclinical Alzheimer's pathology. Little is known, however, about the longitudinal trajectory of this network's intrinsic functional connectivity (FC). In this study, we evaluated longitudinal FC in 111 cognitively normal older human adults (ages 49–87, 46 women/65 men), 92 of whom had at least three task-free...

Are the Neural Correlates of Consciousness in the Front or in the Back of the Cerebral Cortex? Clinical and Neuroimaging Evidence

Journal of Neuroscience October 4, 2017 Melanie Boly, Marcello Massimini, Naotsugu Tsuchiya et al. 591 citations

The role of the frontal cortex in consciousness remains a matter of debate. In this Perspective, we will critically review the clinical and neuroimaging evidence for the involvement of the front versus the back of the cortex in specifying conscious contents and discuss promising research avenues. Dual Perspectives Companion Paper: Should a Few Null Findings Falsify Prefrontal Theories of...

Distinct Oscillatory Frequencies Underlie Excitability of Human Occipital and Parietal Cortex

Journal of Neuroscience February 8, 2017 Jason Samaha, Olivia Gosseries, Bradley R. Postle 131 citations

Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) of human occipital and posterior parietal cortex can give rise to visual sensations called phosphenes. We used near-threshold TMS with concurrent EEG recordings to measure how oscillatory brain dynamics covary, on single trials, with the perception of phosphenes after occipital and parietal TMS. Prestimulus power and phase, predominantly in the alpha band...

Ketamine: NMDA Receptors and Beyond

Journal of Neuroscience November 2, 2016 Charles F Zorumski, Yukitoshi Izumi, Steven Mennerick 252 citations

Human studies examining the effects of the dissociative anesthetic ketamine as a model for psychosis and as a rapidly acting antidepressant have spurred great interest in understanding ketamine's actions at molecular, cellular, and network levels. Although ketamine has unequivocal uncompetitive inhibitory effects on N-methyl-d-aspartate receptors (NMDARs) and may preferentially alter the...

Evidence that Subanesthetic Doses of Ketamine Cause Sustained Disruptions of NMDA and AMPA-Mediated Frontoparietal Connectivity in Humans

Journal of Neuroscience August 19, 2015 Suresh Muthukumaraswamy, Alexander D Shaw, Laura Jackson et al. 244 citations

In this paper, we found that subanesthetic doses of ketamine, similar to those used in antidepressant studies, increase anterior theta and gamma power but decrease posterior theta, delta, and alpha power, as revealed by magnetoencephalographic recordings. Dynamic causal modeling of frontoparietal connectivity changes with ketamine indicated a decrease in NMDA and AMPA-mediated...

Metacognitive Mechanisms Underlying Lucid Dreaming

Journal of Neuroscience January 21, 2015 Elisa Filevich, Martin Dresler, Timothy R. Brick et al. 89 citations

Lucid dreaming is a state of awareness that one is dreaming, without leaving the sleep state. Dream reports show that self-reflection and volitional control are more pronounced in lucid compared with nonlucid dreams. Mostly on these grounds, lucid dreaming has been associated with metacognition. However, the link to lucid dreaming at the neural level has not yet been explored. We sought for...

Baths Salts, Spice, and Related Designer Drugs: The Science Behind the Headlines

Journal of Neuroscience November 12, 2014 Michael H. Baumann, Ernesto Solis, Lucas R. Watterson et al. 157 citations

The abuse of synthetic psychoactive substances known as "designer drugs," or "new psychoactive substances" (NPS), is increasing at an alarming rate. NPS are purchased as alternatives to traditional illicit drugs of abuse and are manufactured to circumvent laws regulating the sale and use of controlled substances. Synthetic cathinones (i.e., "bath salts") and synthetic cannabinoids (i.e.,...

Damage to the Salience Network and Interactions with the Default Mode Network

Journal of Neuroscience August 13, 2014 S. R. Jilka, G. Scott, T. Ham et al. 242 citations

Interactions between the Salience Network (SN) and the Default Mode Network (DMN) are thought to be important for cognitive control. However, evidence for a causal relationship between the networks is limited. Previously, we have reported that traumatic damage to white matter tracts within the SN predicts abnormal DMN function. Here we investigate the effect of this damage on network...

Critical Role of Peripheral Vasoconstriction in Fatal Brain Hyperthermia Induced by MDMA (Ecstasy) under Conditions That Mimic Human Drug Use

Journal of Neuroscience June 4, 2014 Eugene A. Kiyatkin, A. H. Kim, Ken T. Wakabayashi et al. 47 citations

MDMA (Ecstasy) is an illicit drug used by young adults at hot, crowed "rave" parties, yet the data on potential health hazards of its abuse remain controversial. Here, we examined the effect of MDMA on temperature homeostasis in male rats under standard laboratory conditions and under conditions that simulate drug use in humans. We chronically implanted thermocouple microsensors in the nucleus...

Enhanced Medial Prefrontal-Default Mode Network Functional Connectivity in Chronic Pain and Its Association with Pain Rumination

Journal of Neuroscience March 12, 2014 Aaron Kucyi, Massieh Moayedi, Irit Weissman‐fogel et al. 390 citations

Rumination is a form of thought characterized by repetitive focus on discomforting emotions or stimuli. In chronic pain disorders, rumination can impede treatment efficacy. The brain mechanisms underlying rumination about chronic pain are not understood. Interestingly, a link between rumination and functional connectivity (FC) of the brain's default mode network (DMN) has been identified within...