Research published in Journal of Neuroscience

My Fifty Years Thinking about Emotional Consciousness in the Brain.

Journal of Neuroscience July 22, 2026

My Fifty Years Thinking about Emotional Consciousness in the Brain.

DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.0172-26.2026

Electrophysiological Brain Connectivity and Subjective States Evoked by Electrical Stimulation of the Human Mid-thalamus.

Journal of Neuroscience June 3, 2026 Sofia Pantis, Masaya Togo, Dian Lyu et al.

Recent developments in intracranial EEG allow direct recordings from the human thalamus, offering new insight into thalamocortical relationships in the human brain. In this study, we applied direct intracranial electrical stimulation (iES) to the mid-thalamus, within or close to the mediodorsal nucleus, to examine its impact on conscious experience and causal brain connectivity in 30 patients...

DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.2100-25.2026 Full text Seeg Corticothalamic connectivity Intracranial electrical stimulation Mediodorsal thalamus +2

Beta and Gamma Dynamics in Attentional Networks Predict Conscious Reports.

Journal of Neuroscience May 27, 2026 Alfredo Spagna, Jianghao Liu, Paolo Bartolomeo

What neural events precede conscious reports? Hemisphere-asymmetric attentional networks are causally related to conscious perception (Kaufmann et al., 2024; Bartolomeo et al., 2025), but their spectrotemporal dynamics remain unclear. Here, we used magnetoencephalography to examine brain oscillations occurring in human participants (male and female) before a near-threshold target during the...

DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.0590-25.2026 Full text Attentional networks Coherence Magnetoencephalography

Alpha Oscillations Track the Projection of Reactivated Memories into Conscious Awareness.

Journal of Neuroscience April 15, 2026 Benjamin J Griffiths

By definition, episodic memory is a conscious phenomenon. Memory traces reactivated by the hippocampus and reinstated in the sensory cortices need to enter conscious awareness for them to be re-experienced and overtly recalled. However, it remains unclear whether such reactivation in-and-of-itself ensures that memories will be overtly recalled. To investigate this, magnetoencephalography...

DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.1487-25.2026 Full text Meg Mvpa Alpha oscillations Consciousness +2

Delayed, Reduced, and Redundant: Information Processing of Prediction Errors during Human Sleep.

Journal of Neuroscience March 18, 2026 Christine Blume, Marina Dauphin, Maria Niedernhuber et al.

During sleep, the human brain transitions to a "sentinel processing mode," enabling the continued processing of environmental stimuli despite the absence of consciousness. We employed advanced information-theoretic analyses, including mutual information (MI) and co-information (co-I), alongside event-related potential (ERP) and temporal generalization analyses (TGA), to characterize auditory...

DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.1648-25.2026 Full text Consciousness Information decomposition Oddball Prediction error +2

A time-sensitive plasticity distinguishes the rapid and sustained synaptic actions of ketamine from its (2R,6R)-hydroxynorketamine metabolite.

Journal of Neuroscience February 3, 2026 Kyle A Brown, Patrick J. Morris, Craig J. Thomas et al.

(R,S)-ketamine (ketamine) induces rapid and sustained antidepressant-relevant neuroplastogenic effects in vivo. The metabolite (2R,6R)-hydroxynorketamine (2R6R) forms shortly after the administration of ketamine, and independently elicits rapid plasticity and sustained metaplasticity. Ketamine's therapeutic actions appear to result from distinct, time-sensitive plasticity phases, though the...

DOI: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.0958-25.2026 Full text

Emotional and Social Dimension of Abstract Concepts Meet with Interoception in Right Anterior Insula.

Journal of Neuroscience January 14, 2026 Martina Mancano, Costanza Papagno

According to the embodied cognition theory, which claims that concepts' representation is grounded in sensory and motor components, abstract concepts are grounded in interoception, which is processed in the Anterior Insula (AIns). However, it is not clear whether interoception and abstract concepts share common anatomical substrates, and if yes, whether AIns is one candidate. In this study, we...

DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.0238-25.2025 Full text Tms Abstract concepts Anterior insula Emotions +2

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...

DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.0742-24.2025 Full text Serotonergic Serotonin Neurochemical Dopamine +7

DMT-induced shifts in criticality correlate with self-dissolution.

Journal of Neuroscience November 24, 2025 Mona Irrmischer, Marco Aqil, Lisa Luan et al.

Psychedelics profoundly alter subjective experience and brain dynamics. Brain oscillations express signatures of near-critical dynamics, relevant for healthy function. Alterations in the proximity to criticality have been suggested to underlie the experiential and neurological effects of psychedelics. Here, we investigate the effects of a psychedelic substance (DMT) on the criticality of brain...

DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.0344-25.2025 Full text Psychedelic therapy Altered consciousness Non-ordinary states Ego dissolution +15

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...

DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.0652-25.2025 Full text Alcohol use disorder Psilocybin Ethanol Metabolite +11

Electrophysiological Correlates of Lucid Dreaming: Sensor and Source Level Signatures.

Journal of Neuroscience May 14, 2025 Çağatay Demirel, Jarrod Gott, Kristoffer Appel et al. 8 citations

Lucid dreaming (LD) is a state of conscious awareness of the ongoing oneiric state, predominantly linked to REM sleep. Progress in understanding its neurobiological basis has been hindered by small sample sizes, diverse EEG setups, and artifacts like saccadic eye movements. To address these challenges in characterizing the electrophysiological correlates of LD, we introduced an adaptive...

DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.2237-24.2025 Full text Dream lucidity Conscious dreaming Metacognition Self-awareness +6

The Administration of Ketamine Is Associated with Dose-Dependent Stabilization of Cortical Dynamics in Humans.

Journal of Neuroscience May 14, 2025 Diego G Dávila, Andrew McKinstry-Wu, Max B Kelz et al. 5 citations

During wakefulness, external stimuli elicit conscious experiences. In contrast, dreams and drug-induced dissociated states are characterized by vivid internally generated conscious experiences and reduced ability to perceive external stimuli. Understanding the physiological distinctions between normal wakefulness and dissociated states may therefore disambiguate signatures of responsiveness to...

DOI: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1545-24.2025 Full text Ketamine EEG Dissociated state Dynamics +4

Overlapping Cortical Substrate of Biomechanical Control and Subjective Agency.

Journal of Neuroscience April 30, 2025 John P Veillette, Alfred F Chao, Romain Nith et al.

Every movement requires the nervous system to solve a complex biomechanical control problem, but this process is mostly veiled from one's conscious awareness. Simultaneously, we also have conscious experience of controlling our movements-our sense of agency (SoA). Whether SoA corresponds to those neural representations that implement actual neuromuscular control is an open question with...

DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.1673-24.2025 Full text Agency Biomechanics Consciousness FMRI +2

Association of Bidirectional Network Cores in the Brain with Perceptual Awareness and Cognition.

Journal of Neuroscience April 23, 2025 Tomoya Taguchi, Jun Kitazono, Shuntaro Sasai et al.

The brain comprises a complex network of interacting regions. To understand the roles and mechanisms of this intricate network, it is crucial to elucidate its structural features related to cognitive functions. Recent empirical evidence suggests that both feedforward and feedback signals are necessary for conscious perception, emphasizing the importance of subnetworks with bidirectional...

DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.0802-24.2025 Full text Bidirectional Consciousness Functional connectivity Human connectome project +2

Ultra-high Field fMRI Reveals Effect of Ketamine on Vocal Processing in Common Marmosets.

Journal of Neuroscience April 9, 2025 Audrey Dureux, Alessandro Zanini, Azadeh Jafari et al. 3 citations

Auditory deficits are a well-known symptom in neuropsychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia. The noncompetitive N-methyl-d-aspartate receptor antagonist ketamine has been used to model sensory and cognitive deficits in nonhuman primates, but its whole-brain effects remain largely unknown. Here we employed ultra-high field functional magnetic resonance imaging at 9.4 T in awake male and...

DOI: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.0651-24.2025 Full text Ketamine Auditory processing FMRI Marmoset monkeys +3

Effects of Ketamine on Frontoparietal Interactions in a Rule-Based Antisaccade Task in Macaque Monkeys.

Journal of Neuroscience December 11, 2024 Liya Ma, Nupur Katyare, Kevin Johnston et al. 1 citation

Cognitive control is engaged by working memory processes and high-demand situations like antisaccade, where one must suppress a prepotent response. While it is known to be supported by the frontoparietal control network, how intra- and interareal dynamics contribute to cognitive control processes remains unclear. N-Methyl-d-aspartate glutamate receptors (NMDARs) play a key role in prefrontal...

DOI: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1018-23.2024 Full text Cognitive control Functional connectivity Lateral prefrontal cortex Local field potentials +6

Suspending the Embodied Self in Meditation Attenuates Beta Oscillations in the Posterior Medial Cortex.

Journal of Neuroscience June 26, 2024 Fynn-Mathis Trautwein, Yoav Schweitzer, Yair Dor-Ziderman et al. 27 citations

Human experience is imbued by the sense of being an embodied agent. The investigation of such basic self-consciousness has been hampered by the difficulty of comprehensively modulating it in the laboratory while reliably capturing ensuing subjective changes. The present preregistered study fills this gap by combining advanced meditative states with principled phenomenological interviews: 46...

DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.1182-23.2024 Full text Mindfulness Meg Neurophenomenology Posterior cingulate +1

Transient Attention Gates Access Consciousness: Coupling N2pc and P3 Latencies Using Dynamic Time Warping.

Journal of Neuroscience June 26, 2024 Mahan Hosseini, Alon Zivony, Martin Eimer et al. 5 citations

The N2pc and P3 event-related potentials (ERPs), used to index selective attention and access to working memory and conscious awareness, respectively, have been important tools in cognitive sciences. Although it is likely that these two components and the underlying cognitive processes are temporally and functionally linked, such links have not yet been convincingly demonstrated. Adopting a...

DOI: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1798-23.2024 Full text N2pc P3 Consciousness Electroencephalography +2

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...

DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.1907-23.2024 Full text Default mode network Cognition Mode computer interface Semantic network +4

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...

DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.0425-23.2023 Full text

Isolating Neural Signatures of Conscious Speech Perception with a No-Report Sine-Wave Speech Paradigm.

Journal of Neuroscience February 21, 2024 Yunkai Zhu, Charlotte Li, Camille Hendry et al. 8 citations

Identifying neural correlates of conscious perception is a fundamental endeavor of cognitive neuroscience. Most studies so far have focused on visual awareness along with trial-by-trial reports of task-relevant stimuli, which can confound neural measures of perceptual awareness with postperceptual processing. Here, we used a three-phase sine-wave speech paradigm that dissociated between...

DOI: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.0145-23.2023 Full text EEG Awareness Consciousness Perception +1

An Accumulating Neural Signal Underlying Binocular Rivalry Dynamics.

Journal of Neuroscience December 13, 2023 Shaozhi Nie, Sucharit Katyal, Stephen A Engel

During binocular rivalry, conflicting images are presented one to each eye and perception alternates stochastically between them. Despite stable percepts between alternations, modeling suggests that neural signals representing the two images change gradually, and that the duration of stable percepts are determined by the time required for these signals to reach a threshold that triggers an...

DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.1325-23.2023 Full text Ssvep Binocular rivalry Bistable perception Drift-diffusion +1

Beyond the 5-HT2A Receptor: Classic and Nonclassic Targets in Psychedelic Drug Action.

Journal of Neuroscience November 8, 2023 Lindsay P. Cameron, Joseph Benetatos, Vern Lewis et al. 88 citations

Serotonergic psychedelics, such as psilocybin and LSD, have garnered significant attention in recent years for their potential therapeutic effects and unique mechanisms of action. These compounds exert their primary effects through activating serotonin 5-HT2A receptors, found predominantly in cortical regions. By interacting with these receptors, serotonergic psychedelics induce alterations in...

DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.1384-23.2023 Full text Psychedelics Brain chemistry Mental health Pharmacology

Spontaneous α Brain Dynamics Track the Episodic "When".

Journal of Neuroscience October 25, 2023 Leila Azizi, Ignacio Polti, Virginie Van Wassenhove 15 citations

Across species, neurons track time over the course of seconds to minutes, which may feed the sense of time passing. Here, we asked whether neural signatures of time-tracking could be found in humans. Participants stayed quietly awake for a few minutes while being recorded with magnetoencephalography (MEG). They were unaware they would be asked how long the recording lasted (retrospective time)...

DOI: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.0816-23.2023 Full text Burst Neural oscillations Nonstationarity Passage of time +2

Neural Representations in Visual and Parietal Cortex Differentiate between Imagined, Perceived, and Illusory Experiences.

Journal of Neuroscience September 20, 2023 Siyi Li, Xuemei Zeng, Zhujun Shao et al.

Humans constantly receive massive amounts of information, both perceived from the external environment and imagined from the internal world. To function properly, the brain needs to correctly identify the origin of information being processed. Recent work has suggested common neural substrates for perception and imagery. However, it has remained unclear how the brain differentiates between...

DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.0592-23.2023 Full text Early visual cortex FMRI Parietal cortex Reverse hierarchy +1

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