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Updated: Jun 24, 2025

Perspectives on Neuroscience
Published on: July 31, 2007
Unravelling consciousness and brain function through the lens of time, space, and information
Andrea I Luppi1, Fernando E Rosas2, Pedro A M Mediano3
1Division of Anaesthesia, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK; Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK; Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada; St John's College, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK; Center for Eudaimonia and Human Flourishing, Linacre College, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK.
Abstract:
Disentangling how cognitive functions emerge from the interplay of brain dynamics and network architecture is among the major challenges that neuroscientists face. Pharmacological and pathological perturbations of consciousness provide a lens to investigate these complex challenges. Here, we review how recent advances about consciousness and the brain's functional organisation have been driven by a common denominator: decomposing brain function into fundamental constituents of time, space, and information. Whereas unconsciousness increases structure-function coupling across scales, psychedelics may decouple brain function from structure. Convergent effects also emerge: anaesthetics, psychedelics, and disorders of consciousness can exhibit similar reconfigurations of the brain's unimodal-transmodal functional axis. Decomposition approaches reveal the potential to translate discoveries across species, with computational modelling providing a path towards mechanistic integration.
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