Internetwork and intranetwork communications during bursting dynamics: applications to seizure prediction

We use a simple dynamical model of two interacting networks of integrate-and-fire neurons to explain a seemingly paradoxical result observed in epileptic patients indicating that the level of phase synchrony declines below normal levels during the state preceding seizures (preictal state). We model the transition from the seizure free interval (interictal state) to the seizure (ictal state) as a slow increase in the mean depolarization of neurons in a network corresponding to the epileptic focus. We show that the transition from the interictal to preictal and then to the ictal state may be divided into separate dynamical regimes: the formation of slow oscillatory activity due to resonance between the two interacting networks observed during the interictal period, structureless activity during the preictal period when the two networks have different properties, and bursting dynamics driven by the network corresponding to the epileptic focus. Based on this result, we hypothesize that the beginning of the preictal period marks the beginning of the transition of the epileptic network from normal activity toward seizing.