Consciousness-specific dynamic interactions of brain integration and functional diversity

Luppi, Andrea I.; Craig, Michael; Pappas, Ioannis; Finoia, Paola; Williams, Guy B.; Allanson, Judith; Pickard, John D.; Owen, Adrian M.; Naçi, Lorina; Menon, David; Stamatakis, Emmanuel A.

doi:10.1038/s41467-019-12658-9

Cited by 208 publications

(431 citation statements)

References 70 publications

(130 reference statements)

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“…Our findings suggest that regions of the default mode and executive control (sub)networks may be able to support human higher cognition precisely thanks to their extensive involvement with synergistic processing. Intriguingly, the high-synergy DMN is involved in self-related cognitive processes 26,27 , and it is also especially disrupted by loss of consciousness, whether caused by anaesthesia or severe brain injury 28 . Indeed, the global workspace theory of consciousness posits that integration of information within a global workspace is necessary for consciousness 29 -and a formal link has also been established between synergy and the measure of consciousness known as integrated information 3,30 .…”

Section: Neurobiological Origins Of Synergy In the Human Brainmentioning

confidence: 99%

A synergistic core for human brain evolution and cognition

Mediano

et al. 2020

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A fundamental question in neuroscience is how brain organisation gives rise to humans' unique cognitive abilities. Although complex cognition is widely assumed to rely on frontal and parietal brain regions, the underlying mechanisms remain elusive: current approaches are unable to disentangle different forms of information processing in the brain. Here, we introduce a powerful framework to identify synergistic and redundant contributions to neural information processing and cognition. Leveraging multimodal data including functional MRI, PET, cytoarchitectonics and genetics, we reveal that synergistic interactions are the fundamental drivers of complex human cognition. Whereas redundant information dominates sensorimotor areas, synergistic activity is closely associated with the brain's prefrontal-parietal and default networks; furthermore, meta-analytic results demonstrate a close relationship between high-level cognitive tasks and synergistic information. From an evolutionary perspective, the human brain exhibits higher prevalence of synergistic information than non-human primates. At the macroscale, we demonstrate that high-synergy regions underwent the highest degree of evolutionary cortical expansion. At the microscale, human-accelerated genes promote synergistic interactions by enhancing synaptic transmission. These convergent results provide critical insights that synergistic neural interactions underlie the evolution and functioning of humans' sophisticated cognitive abilities, and demonstrate the power of our widely applicable information decomposition framework.

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Section: Neurobiological Origins Of Synergy In the Human Brainmentioning

confidence: 99%

A synergistic core for human brain evolution and cognition

Mediano

et al. 2020

Preprint

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“…Relating subjective mental states to the underlying brain states remains a key challenge for contemporary neuroscience 1 . Despite recent advances, what remains elusive is a principled account of how the spatio-temporal brain dynamics that support consciousness [1][2][3][4][5][6][7] , arise from the interplay of cortical dynamics across the brain's anatomical connections 8 .…”

Section: Main Textmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Therefore, computational and theoretical reasons converge to predict that propofol should induce connectome harmonic alterations that are the opposite of what is observed with psychedelics. To further establish whether the connectome harmonic signature of anaesthesia is representative of other ways of losing consciousness, we also considered a cohort of N=22 patients diagnosed with chronic disorders of consciousness arising from severe brain injury 3 . We investigated whether CHD could detect consciousness in a subset of patients who had previously exhibited evidence of covert consciousness by performing mental imagery tasks in the scanner 25,26 (in terms of specific brain regions activating when patients were asked to imagine playing tennis or navigating around their house) (fMRI+; N=8), compared with patients who had provided no such evidence (fMRI-; N=14).…”

Section: Connectome Harmonic Signatures Of Consciousnessmentioning

confidence: 99%

Distributed harmonic patterns of structure-function dependence orchestrate human consciousness

Luppi

Vohryzek

Kringelbach

et al. 2020

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A central question in neuroscience is how cognition and consciousness arise from human brain activity. Here, we decompose cortical dynamics of resting-state functional MRI into their constituent elements: the harmonics of the human connectome. Mapping a wide spectrum of consciousness onto these elementary brain states reveals a generalisable connectome harmonic signature of loss of consciousness, whether due to anaesthesia or severe brain injury. Remarkably, its mirror-reversed image corresponds to the harmonic signature of the psychedelic state induced by ketamine or LSD, identifying meaningful relationships between neurobiology, brain function, and conscious experience. The repertoire of connectome harmonics further provides a fine-tuned indicator of level of consciousness, sensitive to differences in anaesthetic dose and clinically relevant sub-categories of patients with disorders of consciousness. Overall, we reveal that the emergence of consciousness from human brain dynamics follows the same universal principles shared by a multitude of physical and biological phenomena: the mathematics of harmonic modes.

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“…In addition to the altered static functional connectivity within and between the RSNs, recent studies of anesthetic-induced sedation or unconsciousness have focused on functional brain dynamics and connectivity patterns [ 92 – 95 ]. One recent study combined graph theory and dynamic functional connectivity to compare resting-state functional MRI data from propofol-anesthetised volunteers and patients with disorders of consciousness, in order to identify consciousness-specific patterns of brain function [ 94 ]. The authors demonstrated that loss of consciousness (whether due to propofol anesthesia or traumatic brain injury) is accompanied by reduced functional diversity and integrative capacity in the posterior regions of the brain’ s DMN, especially during temporal states of high integration [ 94 ].…”

Section: Functional Connectivity During Midazolam-induced Sedationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Neuropsychopharmacological effects of midazolam on the human brain

2020

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As a commonly used anesthetic agent, midazolam has the properties of water-soluble, rapid onset, and short duration of action. With the rapid development in the field of neuroimaging, numerous studies have investigated how midazolam acts on the human brain to induce the alteration of consciousness. However, the neural bases of midazolam-induced sedation or anesthesia remain beginning to be understood in detail. In this review, we summarize findings from neuroimaging studies that have used midazolam to study altered consciousness at different levels and content. We also compare the results to those of neuroimaging studies using diverse anesthetic agents and describe the common neural correlates of anesthetic-induced alteration of consciousness.

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Consciousness-specific dynamic interactions of brain integration and functional diversity

Cited by 208 publications

References 70 publications

A synergistic core for human brain evolution and cognition

A synergistic core for human brain evolution and cognition

Distributed harmonic patterns of structure-function dependence orchestrate human consciousness

Neuropsychopharmacological effects of midazolam on the human brain

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