IntroductionThe objective of the presented study was to develop and evaluate a P300 experimental protocol for simultaneous registration of event-related potentials (ERPs) and functional MRI (fMRI) data with continuous imaging. It may be useful for investigating attention and working memory processes in specific populations, such as children and neuropsychiatric patients.Materials and methodsEleven children were investigated with simultaneous ERP–fMRI. To fulfill requirements of both BOLD and electroencephalographic signal registration, a modified oddball task was used. To verify the ERP–fMRI protocol we also performed a study outside the scanner using a typical two-stimuli oddball paradigm.ResultsLocalization of the P300 component of ERPs partially corresponded with fMRI results in the frontal and parietal brain regions. FMRI activations were found in: middle frontal gyrus, insula, SMA, parietal lobule, thalamus, and cerebellum. Our modified oddball task provided ERP–fMRI results with high level of significance (EEG SNR = 35, fMRI p < 0.05–Bonf.). ERPs obtained in the scanner were comparable with those registered outside the scanner, although some differences in the amplitude were noticed, mainly in the N100 component.ConclusionIn our opinion the presented paradigm may be successfully applied for simultaneous ERP–fMRI registration of neural correlates of attention in vulnerable populations.

This study is the first to demonstrate outcomes of slow cortical potential (SCP) Neurofeedback training in chronic tinnitus. A 50-year old male patient with tinnitus participated in three SCP training blocks, separated with 1-month breaks. After the training the patient reported decreased tinnitus loudness and pitch, as well as improved quality of daily life. A quantitative electroencephalography analysis revealed close to normal changes of resting state bioelectrical activity in cortical areas considered to be involved in tinnitus generation. The present case study indicates that SCP Neurofeedback training can be considered a promising method for tinnitus treatment.

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The medial olivocochlear (MOC) system is thought to be responsible for modulation of peripheral hearing through descending (efferent) pathways. This study investigated the connection between peripheral hearing function and conscious attention during two different modality tasks, auditory and visual. Peripheral hearing function was evaluated by analyzing the amount of suppression of otoacoustic emissions (OAEs) by contralateral acoustic stimulation (CAS), a well-known effect of the MOC. Simultaneously, attention was evaluated by event-related potentials (ERPs). Although the ERPs showed clear differences in processing of auditory and visual tasks, there were no differences in the levels of OAE suppression. We also analyzed OAEs for the highest magnitude resonant mode signal detected by the matching pursuit method, but again did not find a significant effect of task, and no difference in noise level or number of rejected trials. However, for auditory tasks, the amplitude of the P3 cognitive wave negatively correlated with the level of OAE suppression. We conclude that there seems to be no change in MOC function when performing different modality tasks, although the cortex still remains able to modulate some aspects of MOC activity.