Manipulation of Subcortical and Deep Cortical Activity in the Primate Brain Using Transcranial Focused Ultrasound
Davide Folloni1, Lennart Verhagen1, Rogier B Mars2
1Wellcome Centre for Integrative Neuroimaging (WIN), Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3SR, UK; Wellcome Centre for Integrative Neuroimaging (WIN), Centre for Functional MRI of the Brain (FMRIB), Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences, John Radcliffe Hospital, University of Oxford, Oxford OX3 9DU, UK.
None:
The causal role of an area within a neural network can be determined by interfering with its activity and measuring the impact. Many current reversible manipulation techniques have limitations preventing their application, particularly in deep areas of the primate brain. Here, we demonstrate that a focused transcranial ultrasound stimulation (TUS) protocol impacts activity even in deep brain areas: a subcortical brain structure, the amygdala (experiment 1), and a deep cortical region, the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC, experiment 2), in macaques. TUS neuromodulatory effects were measured by examining relationships between activity in each area and the rest of the brain using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). In control conditions without sonication, activity in a given area is related to activity in interconnected regions, but such relationships are reduced after sonication, specifically for the targeted areas. Dissociable and focal effects on neural activity could not be explained by auditory confounds.
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