The involvement of the human prefrontal cortex in the emergence of visual awareness.
Zepeng Fang, Yuanyuan Dang, Zhipei Ling, Yongzheng Han, Hulin Zhao, Xin Xu, Mingsha Zhang
eLife January 24, 2024 DOI: 10.7554/eLife.89076 via PubMed
Summary
AI-generated from the abstractSaccadic latency is significantly shorter when people are aware of a visual stimulus than when they are unaware. Local field potential recordings from the prefrontal cortex of six patients show early awareness-related activity, including event-related potentials and high-gamma activity, between 200 and 300 milliseconds. The neural activity in the prefrontal cortex can reliably decode the awareness state from an early stage, and the neural pattern changes dynamically rather than remaining stable during awareness. Enhanced dynamic functional connectivity through low-frequency phase modulation between the prefrontal cortex and other brain regions in early awareness trials may explain the mechanism of conscious access. These results indicate that the prefrontal cortex is critically involved in the emergence of awareness.
Study at a glance
| Characteristics | Experimental study Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Sample size | 6 |
| Population | Human patients with implanted electrodes |
| Keywords | Event related potential Frontal lobe Human Ieeg Local field potential |
| Citations | 16 |
| Key finding | The prefrontal cortex shows early awareness-related neural activity and can reliably decode awareness state, supporting its critical role in the emergence of awareness. |
Abstract
Exploring the neural mechanisms of awareness is a fundamental task of cognitive neuroscience. There is an ongoing dispute regarding the role of the prefrontal cortex (PFC) in the emergence of awareness, which is partially raised by the confound between report- and awareness-related activity. To address this problem, we designed a visual awareness task that can minimize report-related motor confounding. Our results show that saccadic latency is significantly shorter in the aware trials than in the unaware trials. Local field potential (LFP) data from six patients consistently show early (200-300ms) awareness-related activity in the PFC, including event-related potential and high-gamma activity. Moreover, the awareness state can be reliably decoded by the neural activity in the PFC since the early stage, and the neural pattern is dynamically changed rather than being stable during the representation of awareness. Furthermore, the enhancement of dynamic functional connectivity, through the phase modulation at low frequency, between the PFC and other brain regions in the early stage of the awareness trials may explain the mechanism of conscious access. These results indicate that the PFC is critically involved in the emergence of awareness.