New research published in the journal Neuron has unveiled how the spread of brain stimulation can be predicted using the mathematics of networks.
The research included a large group of 550 patients with a history of epilepsy across various continents such as North America and Asia.
“Communication between gray matter regions underpins all facets of brain function,” the findings read. “We study inter-areal communication in the human brain using intracranial EEG recordings, acquired following 29,055 single-pulse direct electrical stimulations in a total of 550 individuals across 20 medical centers.”
“We found that network communication models—computed on structural connectivity inferred from diffusion MRI—can explain the causal propagation of focal stimuli, measured at millisecond timescales.”
“Our work contributes toward the biological validation of concepts in network neuroscience and provides insight into how connectome topology shapes polysynaptic inter-areal signaling. We anticipate that our findings will have implications for research on neural communication and the design of brain stimulation paradigms,” according to researchers.
