Machine Learning on Dynamic Functional Connectivity: Promise, Pitfalls, and Interpretations.

Relieving driver fatigue is crucial for ensuring traffic safety. Existing research lacks an exploration of the feasibility and effectiveness of using implicit emotion modulation methods to alleviate driver fatigue. In this study, the effects of Emotional Sensory (olfactory or olfactory-auditory) Stimuli (ESS) on modulating driver fatigue are explored, and the underlying neural mechanisms are analyzed based on the spatio-temporal dynamic patterns of Electroencephalogram (EEG) signals. First, a real-world driver fatigue modulation experiment based on ESS was designed to record EEG signals. Second, brain activation patterns under various ESS were investigated by analyzing brain functional networks. Furthermore, dynamic changes in fatigue-related features were analyzed to examine the strength and persistence of driver fatigue modulation for each ESS.Finally, a fatigue similarity measure method was adopted to quantify the fatigue recovery level under ESS in a more intuitive manner. The results demonstrate that the mint odor-High-Arousal-Low-Valence (HALV) music stimulus exhibits the best driver fatigue modulation effects, and is superior to singular olfactory stimuli. Furthermore, dynamic brain functional connectivity analysis reveals that effective driver fatigue modulation tends to be strongly synchronized in the frontal and parietal lobes. The optimal olfactory-auditory mixed stimuli restores driver fatigue to the level 58-60[Formula: see text]min ago. Our findings shed light on the dynamic characterization of functional connectivity during driver fatigue modulation and demonstrate the potential of using ESS as a reliable implicit tool for modulating driver fatigue.

Discriminating between major depressive disorder and bipolar depression: Aberrant EEG microstate dynamics and machine learning classification.

Brain functional network dynamics in women with alleged mediumship: a controlled study.

Central neural control of pelvic floor control - Insights from functional brain imaging.

Planning requires anticipating the environmental contingencies that we will encounter and also our own future behaviour in those scenarios. The evolutionary origins of such prospective decision simulations have, however, been difficult to investigate. Moreover, in humans, these metacognitive processes are associated with a distinctively human brain region in the anterior lateral prefrontal cortex. Here we demonstrate these capacities in macaques and their neural bases in two complementary patterns of brain activity in different ventrolateral prefrontal areas: areas 45a and 47/12o. We also examine the impact of ultrasonic disruption of each area. We compare behavioural, brain activity and disruption patterns in humans and macaques. Finally, comparative connectional analysis revealed similarities between the conjunction of the two circuits associated with areas 45a and 47/12o in macaques and the human anterior lateral prefrontal area. In combination, the results suggest behavioural and anatomical origins of metacognitive processes that have become especially sophisticated in humans.

Standing is a complex task often performed concurrently with a cognitive task. This type of "dual-tasking" requires attentional processing and related patterns of brain activation, particularly in the gamma frequency band of electrographic (EEG) signals (30-50 Hz). In older adults, transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) designed to facilitate the excitability of the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (L-DLPFC) improves attentional control and dual-task standing performance when tested just after stimulation. However, the effects of tDCS on underlying brain activity during single- and dual-task standing are unknown. Thirty older adults completed three visits during which they received 20 minutes of tDCS targeting the L-DLPFC, the primary sensorimotor cortex (SM1, active control), or sham (inactive control) in randomized order. Before and immediately after each stimulation session, 32-channel EEG and body-worn motion sensors were used as participants completed trials of standing with and without verbalized serial subtractions. tDCS targeting L-DLPFC, as compared to SM1 and sham stimulation, increased gamma power during single-task standing in the anterior left (p = 0.02) and anterior right regions (p = 0.03). A similar trend (p = 0.08) towards increased gamma power in these regions following tDCS targeting the L-DLPFC was also observed during dual-task standing. Participants who demonstrated a greater increase in gamma power after tDCS targeting L-DLPFC exhibited greater reduction (improvement) in postural sway during single-task standing (r=-0.53, p = 0.007) and dual-task standing (r=-0.51, p = 0.003). These results suggest that tDCS designed to facilitate L-DLPFC excitability modulates gamma power during single-task standing, which was in turn correlated with improved postural control, in older adults.

Somatic symptom disorder (SSD) is characterized by persistent physical symptoms that cannot be fully explained by structural abnormalities or laboratory findings. However, the underlying neural mechanisms of SSD remain poorly understood. This study aimed to investigate functional brain abnormalities in SSD patients presenting predominantly with chest pain using resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI). A total of 102 participants were prospectively enrolled, including 56 patients with SSD and 46 healthy controls (HCs). All participants underwent clinical assessments and structural MRI examinations, including T2-weighted imaging (T2WI), T1-weighted imaging (T1WI), diffusion-weighted imaging (DWI), fluid-attenuated inversion recovery (FLAIR), and rs-fMRI. The rs-fMRI metrics included regional homogeneity (ReHo), amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations (ALFF), and fractional ALFF (fALFF). Group comparisons were conducted to identify differences in brain activity, and correlation analyses were performed to examine associations between brain activity and clinical symptoms. No significant differences were observed between the two groups in demographic variables, including age, gender, and education level. Clinical assessments revealed that SSD patients scored significantly higher than HCs on the Patient Health Questionnaire-15 (PHQ-15), Somatic Symptom Scale (SSS), Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7 (GAD-7), and Hamilton Depression Scale (HAMD). ALFF, fALFF, and ReHo analyses demonstrated significant alterations in spontaneous neural activity in SSD patients compared with HCs. Specifically, increased activity was observed in the left inferior frontal gyrus and precuneus, whereas decreased activity was detected in the hippocampus and insula. Correlation analyses revealed significant associations between these abnormal brain activity patterns and clinical symptom severity in SSD patients. This study highlights regional functional brain abnormalities in SSD, particularly in regions associated with emotion regulation, memory, and sensory processing. These findings provide novel insights into the neural mechanisms underlying SSD and suggest potential neuroimaging targets for therapeutic interventions that may help alleviate symptoms and improve patient outcomes.

Pain in knee osteoarthritis (KOA) often shows a limited correlation with radiographic severity, complicating clinical assessment and highlighting the relevance of central pain mechanisms. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) enables the investigation of brain regions such as the amygdala and nucleus accumbens, which are increasingly recognized as key components of the affective-motivational dimension of chronic pain and may show differential activation across clinical treatment contexts. This study is part of the HOLOA Project (Clinical and virtual examination of patients for holistic and objective description of the osteoarthritis progression mechanisms). We conducted a cross-sectional observational study nested within the HOLOA cohort. Thirty-one patients with KOA (20 managed conservatively [CM] and 11 observed in the surgical treatment context) with Kellgren Lawrence (KL) grades 2-3 were included. Participants underwent two fMRI paradigms involving pressure stimulation (Knee Interline and Tibial Surface tests). Clinical assessment included the Western Ontario and McMaster Universities Osteoarthritis Index (WOMAC), Pain Catastrophizing Scale (PCS), Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS), and Numeric Rating Scale (NRS). Group comparisons and correlation analyses were performed to examine associations between clinical measures and brain activation patterns. Groups were broadly comparable with no statistically significant differences in demographic or radiographic severity measures. These patients showed higher WOMAC and PCS scores, indicating greater functional impairment and pain catastrophizing. Across the whole cohort, painful stimulation elicited robust activation of classical pain-processing regions, while no significant amygdala or nucleus accumbens activation was observed at the group level. However, nucleus accumbens activity was positively associated with PCS scores. In between-group analyses, patients observed in the surgical treatment context exhibited significant bilateral amygdala activation during Tibial Surface stimulation, which was absent in the conservatively managed group, and reported higher post-test NRS scores. Limbic system activation and pain catastrophizing were associated with the surgical treatment context in patients with knee osteoarthritis within a similar range of radiographic severity. The observed involvement of the amygdala and nucleus accumbens underscores the relevance of affective-motivational and cognitive processes in chronic KOA pain. These findings support the value of integrating clinical, psychological, and neurobiological perspectives when interpreting symptom burden and treatment context in knee osteoarthritis.

BackgroundSleep is an essential component of memory consolidation and waste clearance, including pathology associated with Alzheimer's disease (AD). Facilitation of sleep decreases amyloid-β (Aβ) and tau accumulation and is important for memory consolidation.ObjectiveWe previously found that 6-month female 3xTg-AD mice were impaired at spatial reorientation learning and memory. Given the association between sleep and AD, we assessed the impact of added rest on impaired spatial reorientation that we previously observed.MethodsWe randomly assigned 3xTg-AD mice to a sleep (n = 7; 50-60 min pre- & post-task induced rest) or a non-sleep group (n = 7; remained in home cage pre- & post- task). Mice in both groups were compared to non-Tg, age-matched, non-sleep controls (n = 6). To confirm that our rest condition induced sleep, we performed the same experiment with rest sessions for both 3xTg-AD and non-Tg mice (n = 5/group) implanted with recording electrodes to capture local field potentials, which were used to classify sleep states. Markers of pathology (AT8, 6E10, M78, and M22) were also assessed in the parietal-hippocampal network, where we previously showed pTau (AT8) positive cell density predicted spatial reorientation ability.ResultsWe found that 3xTg-AD sleep mice were unimpaired at spatial reorientation compared to non-Tg mice and performed better than 3xTg-AD non-sleep mice (replicating our previous work). This recovered behavior was apparent despite no change in the density of pathology-positive cells. Further, theta-gamma coupling during sleep may explain the facilitated cognition in 3xTg-AD sleep mice, suggesting brain activity patterns during sleep may mediate the restored cognition.ConclusionsImproving sleep in early stages of AD pathology offers a promising approach for facilitating memory consolidation and improving cognition.

Visual working memory is essential for navigating through and interacting with complex real-world environments. It is therefore important to understand how natural visual inputs-characterized by complex contours, continuously varying feature gradients, and spatial relationships-are represented in working memory. However, most research in this field has focused on simplified arrays of discrete artificial objects, favoring experimental control and modeling simplicity over ecological validity. This has led to quantitative models of working memory that require inputs consisting of easily parsed objects defined by a single value along one or more simple feature dimensions. It is not clear how these models could be updated to represent complex, photograph-like scenes. To overcome this limitation, we introduce a population vector model of working memory that was designed specifically for real-world scenes. This model represents a scene as a noisy vector of neural firing rates across one or more areas of the ventral pathway, as estimated by a deep neural network model. We show that this model can account for both variations in behavioral performance and patterns of brain activity in tasks that require storing naturalistic scenes in working memory. These results demonstrate the viability of our general modeling approach, setting the stage for more sophisticated models that can fully account for the storage of real-world scenes in working memory. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

Inhibitory control in problematic usage of the internet: An ALE meta-analysis.

Lateralized neural and oculomotor alterations in temporal lobe epilepsy: A combined eye-tracking and event-related potential study.

Portraits and memory: Investigating HF-rTMS effects on episodic recall through a sham-controlled fMRI study.

Age-related neural dynamics revealed by time-domain fNIRS decoding of audiovisual dual-task processing.

Aberrant brain activity during sad-happy emotional switching in adolescents with bipolar disorder: A functional MRI study.

Healthy older adults exhibit both selective impairments in episodic memory - memory for events situated within a specific time and place - and deficits in executive function, reflected by difficulty switching between different tasks and inhibiting task-irrelevant information. Prior work has shown that older adults show diminished mnemonic brain state engagement - recruitment of whole brain activity patterns that selectively support memory encoding and memory retrieval. Our hypothesis is that older adults are biased toward the retrieval state and, due to executive function deficits, cannot easily switch out of this state when task-irrelevant. Our goal was to determine the extent to which stimulus processing time impacts older adult mnemonic state engagement, with the expectation that longer processing times would enable older adults to switch out of a task-irrelevant retrieval state. We recorded scalp electroencephalography (EEG) while younger and older adult participants explicitly encoded and retrieved object stimuli under variable stimulus durations. Using a combination of multivariate decoding approaches, we find that under time constraints, older adults both under-recruit a young-adult like retrieval state when task-relevant, but over-recruit a participant-specific retrieval state when task-irrelevant. Older adults may thus recruit idiosyncratic activity patterns to compensate for difficulties engaging young-adult like mnemonic brain states. Taken together, these findings suggest that although older adults retain the ability to engage encoding and retrieval brain states, they require more processing time to both initiate and maintain goal-relevant mnemonic states.

Background: Long-term methamphetamine use disrupts brain function and impairs cognition. Currently, there is a lack of effective treatments for cognitive dysfunction in this population. This study aimed to investigate the effects of different exercise interventions on cognitive function and brain activation in methamphetamine-dependent individuals and to explore the potential neural mechanisms underlying cognitive improvement. Methods: In this randomized, assessor-blind, controlled study, 162 male methamphetamine-dependent individuals in compulsory isolation were randomly assigned to one of four groups: traditional regimen training (TR, n = 41), aerobic exercise (AE, n = 40), multimodal cognitive exercise training (MC, n = 40), and a control group (MA, n = 41). All participants completed an 8-week intervention. Cognitive function was assessed before and after the intervention using the Stroop task, while fNIRS was used to measure task-related hemodynamic responses. In addition, the Memory and Executive Screening (MES) and choice reaction time tests were used to evaluate cognitive and psychomotor performance. Results: After 8 weeks, traditional regimen training (p = 0.006), aerobic exercise (p = 0.024), and multimodal cognitive exercise training (p < 0.001) all significantly improved Stroop task accuracy. Aerobic exercise significantly increased activation in L-DLPFC (p = 0.044), R-DLPFC (p = 0.036), and L-FPA (p = 0.038), improved MES-T scores (p < 0.001) and shortened choice reaction time (p < 0.001). Traditional regimen training increased L-DLPFC activation (p = 0.026), improved MES-T scores (p < 0.001), and shortened choice reaction time (p < 0.001). Multimodal cognitive exercise training increased activation in L-DLPFC (p = 0.006), R-DLPFC (p = 0.014), and L-FPA (p = 0.002), improved MES-T scores (p < 0.001) and shortened choice reaction time (p < 0.001). Conclusions: Cognitive impairment in methamphetamine-dependent individuals may be associated with reduced prefrontal functional activity. Different exercise modalities produced different patterns of cognitive improvement and brain activation, with multimodal cognitive exercise training showing the largest overall benefit.

Serotonin (5-hydroxytryptamine, 5-HT) type-1 G protein-coupled receptors are expressed throughout the central nervous system. 5-HT1AR activation is the putative mechanism of approved drugs for generalized anxiety disorder and major depressive disorder and is being studied in the treatment of autism and neurological disorders. The 5-HT1B and 5-HT1DRs are the putative therapeutic targets for "triptan"-type migraine drugs, and the 5-HT1BR is associated with prosocial effects, relative to autism treatment, consistent with its high expression in limbic and cortical brain regions. Under study is a recently developed drug candidate for autism, (S)-5-(2'-fluorophenyl)-2-dimethylaminotetralin (FPT), that is a full efficacy pan-5-HT1R agonist (pEC50 = 7.4, 9.4, and 8.6 at 5-HT1A, 5-HT1B, and 5-HT1DRs, respectively). FPT demonstrates anti-seizure, anxiolytic, and prosocial properties, as well as reduces stereotypic movements in Fmr1 knockout mice, a model for autism. The goal of this study was to compare brain activation patterns of the pan-5-HT1R agonist FPT to NLX-112, a highly selective 5-HT1AR full agonist (pEC50 = 7.5) which also prevents seizures in Fmr1 knockout mice, to help establish therapeutic mechanisms in autism. We used pharmacological magnetic resonance imaging (phMRI) in awake C57BL/J6 mice to assess activation of integrated neuronal circuits as measured by blood oxygen level dependent volume of activation changes, comparing dose-related effects of FPT and NLX-112. The selective 5HT1AR agonist NLX-112 broadly inhibited brain activity in a dose-dependent manner. In contrast, FPT increased global brain activity; however, dose-related effects were complex, suggesting FPT's polypharmacology at 5-HT1Rs and perhaps other receptors are involved in its brain activation pattern.

Post-stroke aphasia (PSA) is a common and debilitating sequela of stroke that severely impairs quality of life. Non-invasive brain stimulation (NIBS), particularly repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) and transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), has increasingly emerged as a promising adjunctive approach for language recovery in patients with PSA. Although accumulating evidence supports the beneficial effects of NIBS on language outcomes, the neural mechanisms underlying these clinical improvements remain incompletely elucidated. Previous meta-analyses in PSA and stroke have synthesized multiple resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI) indices, but no meta-analysis has specifically examined treatment-related fractional amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations (fALFF) changes after NIBS in PSA. This protocol describes a coordinate-based meta-analysis designed to quantitatively synthesize rs-fMRI data, aiming to investigate how NIBS modulates intrinsic neural activity-indexed by fALFF-in patients with PSA. Two independent reviewers will conduct a systematic search of the PubMed, Web of Science, Embase, and Cochrane databases for studies published from database inception to December 1, 2025. Eligible studies evaluating the effects of NIBS on fALFF in patients with PSA will be selected based on pre-defined criteria. Only whole-brain voxel-wise fALFF studies reporting stereotactic peak coordinates in standard space will be entered into the primary quantitative AES-SDM analysis; ROI-only studies or studies without usable coordinates will be retained for narrative synthesis. Any discrepancies arising during study selection or data extraction will be resolved through consultation with a third independent reviewer. Neuroimaging reporting quality will be assessed with a customized 20-point checklist, and risk of bias will be evaluated with design-specific tools (RoB 2 for randomized trials and ROBINS-I for non-randomized intervention studies). We will also record studies using other rs-fMRI indices (e.g., ALFF, ReHo, and functional connectivity) during screening to describe the broader evidence base. The primary outcome measures will focus on alterations in specific intrinsic regional neuronal activity assessed via rs-fMRI. The meta-analysis of neuroimaging data will be conducted using Anisotropic Effect Size Seed-Based d Mapping (AES-SDM, version 5.15), while clinical outcome analyses will be performed using RevMan 5.4 software (The Cochrane Collaboration). The reporting of this study will strictly adhere to the PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) guidelines. This study will quantitatively synthesize findings from independent neuroimaging studies to provide comprehensive evidence for identifying the modulation patterns of intrinsic brain activity induced by NIBS in patients with PSA. Identifier CRD420251275236. https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/PROSPERO/view/CRD420251275236.