Blink Synchronized Brain Activation: Association With Ascending Arousal Network

Abstract

Eye-blinking has been implicated in arousal and attention. Here we test the hypothesis that, blinking-moments represent arousal transitions associated with activation of the ascending arousal network (AAN) and its thalamic projections. For this purpose, we explored the temporal relationship between eye-blinks and fMRI BOLD activity in the AAN and thalamus during a choice-reward task and an eyes-open resting state. We show that during the task, blinks were associated with activation of AAN and thalamic nuclei at the blink moment. During rest, peaks of AAN and thalamic nuclei were not synchronized and appeared weaker except for the ventral tegmental area (VTA). Our findings of an association between eye blinks and activation of the AAN and thalamus provides strong evidence in support of the role of eye blinking in arousal transitions that are influenced by cognitive states. It also corroborates the involvement of the dopaminergic VTA nucleus in eye blinking.