Transcranial High-Frequency Terahertz Stimulation Alleviates Anxiety-like Behavior in Mice via a Noninvasive Approach

Area of Science:

• Biomedical Engineering
• Neuroscience
• Physics

Background:

• Terahertz waves offer potential for biomedical applications, but in vivo uses remain largely unexplored.
• Anxiety disorders represent a significant global health burden with unmet therapeutic needs.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the efficacy of noninvasive high-frequency terahertz stimulation (HFTS) as a novel treatment for anxiety in a mouse model.
• To elucidate the underlying neural mechanisms responsible for the anxiolytic effects of HFTS.

Main Methods:

• Induction of anxiety in mice via acute restraint stress, followed by clustering into susceptible and resilient groups using K-means algorithm.
• Development of a Naïve Bayes classifier for accurate anxiety phenotype prediction.
• Application of noninvasive HFTS to the anterior cingulate cortex and subsequent electrophysiological and morphological analyses.

Main Results:

• Noninvasive HFTS demonstrated a significant anxiolytic effect in anxiety-susceptible mice.
• HFTS was found to decrease the excitability of pyramidal neurons in the anterior cingulate cortex.
• The anxiolytic effect is mediated by enhanced voltage-gated K+ and leak K+ channel conductance.

Conclusions:

• Noninvasive HFTS shows promise as a therapeutic modality for anxiety-like disorders.
• The findings provide mechanistic insights into the neural regulation of anxiety by terahertz waves.
• This study lays groundwork for future research in physical biomedicine and noninvasive neuromodulation.