Transcranial ultrasonic stimulation of the central thalamus reduces arousal in healthy volunteers
Poster No:
59
Submission Type:
Late-Breaking Abstract Submission
Authors:
Amber Hopkins1, Joshua Cain1, Elizabeth White1, Stephanie Abakians1, Martin Monti1
Institutions:
1University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA
First Author:
Co-Author(s):
Introduction:
Individual thalamic nuclei make distinct contributions to cognition. For instance, the central thalamus has been implicated in arousal and consciousness (Schiff, 2008) while the pulvinar is involved in visual processing and visuospatial attention (Zhou, Schafer, & Desimone, 2016). However, current knowledge about the contributions of these thalamic regions relies on correlational neuroimaging studies with healthy volunteers (Baker et al., 2014; Kastner et al., 2004) or lesion and invasive neurostimulation research with non-human animal models (Redinbaugh et al., 2020; Wilke, Kagan, & Andersen, 2013; Zhou et al., 2016) and human patients (Rafal & Posner, 1987; Schiff, 2008). The emerging technique of low-intensity, focused transcranial ultrasound stimulation (tFUS) addresses this gap, allowing for the safe and non-invasive modulation of deep brain tissue in healthy volunteers with high spatial precision (Darmani et al., 2022). In this work, we leverage tFUS to dissociate the roles of the central thalamus and the pulvinar in healthy volunteers.
Methods:
In a within-subjects, sham-controlled, counterbalanced design, 27 healthy volunteers completed the Psychomotor Vigilance Task (PVT), a measure of vigilance, and the Egly-Driver Task (EDT), which assesses visuospatial attention, before and after central thalamus, pulvinar, and sham sonication using tFUS (see Fig. 1A).
Results:
Targeting the central thalamus with tFUS impaired performance on both tasks in a manner consistent with decreases in arousal. Participants took longer to respond and showed more lapses in attention during the PVT (see Fig. 1B) but also detected visual targets less often during the EDT (see Fig. 1C) after central thalamus sonication compared to sham and pulvinar sonication. Targeting the pulvinar with tFUS led to less pronounced yet more specific disruptions in visuospatial attention compared to sham sonication. Specifically, participants detected visual targets less often when a spatial cue directed their attention to the left visual field (ipsilateral to the targeted pulvinar), but the visual target appeared on the right (see Fig. 1C; right), competing for attentional resources.
Conclusions:
We present the first causal evidence linking the central thalamus to arousal and the pulvinar to visuospatial attention in the healthy human brain. These results demonstrate that tFUS can elicit notable behavioral changes in healthy volunteers but also underscore its potential as a high-resolution tool for non-invasive brain mapping capable of differentiating the functional contributions of thalamic regions only millimeters apart.
Brain Stimulation:
Sonic/Ultrasound 1
Perception, Attention and Motor Behavior:
Attention: Visual
Consciousness and Awareness 2
Perception: Visual
Sleep and Wakefulness
Keywords:
Consciousness
Perception
Thalamus
ULTRASOUND
Other - Attention
1|2Indicates the priority used for review
Abstract Information
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2. Darmani, G., Bergmann, T. O., Butts Pauly, K., Caskey, C. F., de Lecea, L., Fomenko, A., . . . Chen, R. (2022). Non-invasive transcranial ultrasound stimulation for neuromodulation. Clinical Neurophysiology, 135, 51-73. doi:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.clinph.2021.12.010
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5. Redinbaugh, M. J., Phillips, J. M., Kambi, N. A., Mohanta, S., Andryk, S., Dooley, G. L., . . . Saalmann, Y. B. (2020). Thalamus Modulates Consciousness via Layer-Specific Control of Cortex. Neuron, 106(1), 66-75.e12. doi:10.1016/j.neuron.2020.01.005
6. Schiff, N. D. (2008). Central thalamic contributions to arousal regulation and neurological disorders of consciousness. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1129(1), 105-118.
7. Wilke, M., Kagan, I., & Andersen, R. A. (2013). Effects of pulvinar inactivation on spatial decision-making between equal and asymmetric reward options. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 25(8), 1270-1283.
8. Zhou, H., Schafer, Robert J., & Desimone, R. (2016). Pulvinar-Cortex Interactions in Vision and Attention. Neuron, 89(1), 209-220. doi:10.1016/j.neuron.2015.11.034