Alex Jinich-Diamant
preprint
Mystical states induced by psychedelics, meditation, or fasting all converge on the same brain state: a transient near-critical regime. Serotonergic psychedelics relax top-down priors by sensitizing layer 5 pyramidal neurons; open-monitoring meditation elevates cortical entropy through altered thalamocortical connectivity; caloric restriction destabilizes the default mode network by attenuating metabolic support for high-level attractors. The depth of the mystical state, not the method of induction, predicts lasting therapeutic benefit, suggesting conscious experience itself is the mechanistic agent of change. This framework proposes that near-critical dynamics may allow field-theoretic and quantum-coherent contributions to consciousness to become detectable.
Zümrüt Duygu Sen, Nitin Sharma, Lena Vera Danyeli et al.
preprint
Ketamine causes temporary dissociative experiences alongside its rapid therapeutic effects. This study examined whether pleasant and unpleasant dissociations can be predicted by functional connectivity of the posteromedial cortex (PMC) in 35 male participants during ultrahigh-field MRI. Pleasant dissociation (oceanic boundlessness) was predicted by PMC connections with control network regions at baseline and during infusion, and additionally with default mode network regions during infusion. Unpleasant dissociation (anxious ego dissolution) could not be predicted by PMC connectivity. The findings suggest distinct brain mechanisms for pleasant versus unpleasant dissociations, and that PMC connectivity changes may be a shared neural feature of dissociation from both ketamine and psychedelics.
Noam Goldway, Taly Markovits, Naomi Fine et al.
preprint
Dissociation—feeling detached from one's body, surroundings, or self—is common in PTSD but its neural basis is poorly understood. Using network control theory, researchers examined brain dynamics during dissociative states in two contexts: ketamine-induced dissociation in 30 healthy volunteers and therapeutic interventions in 78 PTSD patients. Ketamine produced brain dynamics similar to those seen in PTSD patients before treatment, with increased dominance of a default mode network meta-state and decreased dominance of a somatomotor meta-state. Ketamine did not significantly alter the brain's energetic landscape, but transition energies increased after PTSD treatment, suggesting more organized, less entropic brain dynamics.
Tony Montgomery
A simple endogenous tryptamine can profoundly alter perception and self-modeling. The Birth Echo Hypothesis proposes that during a narrow perinatal window around delivery, a convergence of stress, sensory novelty, and neuromodulators biases encoding of high-salience sensorimotor templates. In adulthood, exogenous DMT may reconfigure brain dynamics via 5-HT2A and sigma-1 receptors, making these preverbal templates accessible as archetypal, emotionally intense, synesthetic content. DMT is framed as a co-modulator within an evolved perinatal regulatory ensemble. Testable predictions include adult DMT phenomenology showing perinatal-consistent motifs, neonatal EEG/fMRI state-space similarity to adult DMT states, and peri-parturient biospecimens revealing DMT-pathway marker co-variation. The hypothesis reframes psychedelic phenomenology as structural re-expression of early sensorimotor templates.
bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory)
Iga Adamska, Karolina Finc
1 citation
preprint
Listening to music while under the influence of LSD alters the brain's moment-to-moment patterns of activity, particularly in networks linked to attention and task performance. In a study of 15 participants who underwent functional MRI scans after taking LSD or a placebo, the combination of music and LSD changed how long the brain stayed in a task-positive state. LSD alone, regardless of music, affected the dynamics of a state involving the default mode, somatomotor, and visual networks. Music itself appeared to have a lingering effect on resting-state brain activity, especially on networks associated with tasks. These findings suggest that music, as part of the setting, can shape the psychedelic experience at a neural level.
Journal of affective disorders
September 1, 2026
Nesreen Sedeek, Carley Rivers, Lucas Williamson et al.
Ketamine's rapid antidepressant effects in treatment-resistant depression are linked to changes in brain activity, but previous studies have been hard to compare due to differences in imaging techniques, analysis methods, and timing. A review combining fMRI and PET studies found that ketamine-related effects commonly appear in subcortical brain regions, with more variable effects in cortical areas like the prefrontal and anterior cingulate cortices. Network-level patterns suggest involvement of the default-mode, ventral attention, and visual systems. These findings are hypothesis-generating and highlight the need for future studies that harmonize methods to directly connect circuit changes to molecular mechanisms and clinical outcomes.
Frontiers in Human Neuroscience
July 17, 2026
Haruki Emori, Andrei Khrennikov, Atsushi Iriki
Cognitive neuroscience has accumulated robust findings that systematically resist explanation within classical probabilistic and causal frameworks, including order effects in judgment, multi-path motor preparation, perceptual binding, attentional selection, and the recursive construction of self and time. The authors argue these are signatures of a deeper, non-commutative architecture of cognition and brain dynamics. They propose quantum probability theory together with contextual probability theory as rigorous translational languages for cognitive processes, where observation actively transforms underlying state spaces. The framework suggests neural network dynamics are intrinsically organized to generate quantum-like representations, with structural primitives mapping onto specific brain activities. They outline a new sub-domain called Cognitive Structural Science and a research program combining human-macaque experiments with quantum-computer simulation.
PsyArXiv Preprints
July 16, 2026
A theoretical framework interprets immersive neurogastronomic experiences as a form of ambient cognitive modulation. Based on informal observation of approximately 6,000 guests over six years at Sensorium, an eleven-seat restaurant with controlled multisensory architecture, the authors propose that intentional, layered sensory overstimulation may selectively inhibit dominant analytical processing and reduce Default Mode Network activity, favoring a shift in brain oscillatory states from alpha toward theta. This hypothesized neurobiological shift, potentially observable within a single dining session, may correspond to heightened presence, reduced critical self-monitoring, and access to ordinarily unavailable inner states. A three-stage model—Saturation, Analytical Surrender, and Incorporeal Immersion—is introduced.
Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research)
July 10, 2026
Евгений Вацлавович Волынец
This publication extends the author's MASV-Prime architecture to describe humans as biological modal computing structures. Rather than a sum of organs, isolated consciousness, or digital machine analog, a human is a multi-level system of retention where nucleon-atomic construct, molecular organization, tissues, organs, neural dynamics, memory, self-observation, and action form a unified subject mode. The study unfolds from the organism's material base to its operator level. The brain is defined as a region of high dynamic connectivity that holds sequences of states, forms memory, links heterogeneous functional layers, and creates a temporarily stable 'I' configuration.
medRxiv
July 10, 2026
Lada Kohoutová, Jevita Potheegadoo, Léa F Duong Phan Thanh et al.
Hallucinations in Parkinson's disease, from minor to structured, are linked to changes in brain connectivity and cognitive decline. Non-demented patients with minor or structured hallucinations share a common pattern of resting-state functional connectivity that is absent in patients without hallucinations. This pattern involves connections between subcortical areas and visual, attention, and default mode networks, as well as within-cerebellar and within-subcortical connectivity. The pattern is equally expressed in both hallucination groups and is associated with impairments in attention and executive function, as well as increased sensitivity to an experimental procedure that induces presence hallucinations. The findings suggest that altered subcortical-cortical connectivity underlies hallucinations even in their early, minor forms.