Hoy Kate E, Bailey Neil, Arnold Sara, Windsor Kirstyn, John Joshua, Daskalakis Zafiris J, Fitzgerald Paul B
Monash Alfred Psychiatry Research Centre, The Alfred and Monash University, Central Clinical School, Victoria, Australia.
Monash Alfred Psychiatry Research Centre, The Alfred and Monash University, Central Clinical School, Victoria, Australia.
Brain Cogn. 2015 Dec;101:51-6. doi: 10.1016/j.bandc.2015.11.002. Epub 2015 Nov 12.
Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation (tDCS) has been widely investigated for its potential to enhance cognition, and in particular working memory, however to date standard approaches to stimulation have shown only modest effects. Alternative, more specialised, forms of current delivery may be better suited to cognitive enhancement. One such method is transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation (tACS) which delivers stimulation at a specific frequency and has been shown to entrain endogenous cortical oscillations which underlie cognitive functioning. To date there has been no comparison of the effects of tACS to those of tDCS on cognitive enhancement. In a randomised repeated-measures study design we assessed the effect of gamma (γ)-tACS, tDCS and sham tDCS on working memory in 18 healthy participants who attended three sessions held at least 72h apart. Pre- and post-stimulation working memory performance was assessed using the 2 and 3-back. Our findings indicated the presence of a selective improvement in performance on the 3-back task following γ-tACS compared with tDCS and sham stimulation. The current findings provide support for further and more detailed investigation of the role of γ-tACS as a more specialised approach to neuromodulation.
经颅直流电刺激（tDCS）因其增强认知尤其是工作记忆的潜力而受到广泛研究，然而迄今为止，标准的刺激方法仅显示出适度的效果。替代性的、更具特异性的电流传递形式可能更适合于认知增强。一种这样的方法是经颅交流电刺激（tACS），它以特定频率传递刺激，并且已被证明能诱导作为认知功能基础的内源性皮层振荡。迄今为止，尚未对tACS和tDCS在认知增强方面的效果进行比较。在一项随机重复测量研究设计中，我们评估了γ-经颅交流电刺激（γ-tACS）、经颅直流电刺激（tDCS）和伪经颅直流电刺激对18名健康参与者工作记忆的影响，这些参与者参加了至少间隔72小时的三次实验。使用2-back和3-back任务评估刺激前后的工作记忆表现。我们的研究结果表明，与经颅直流电刺激和伪刺激相比，γ-经颅交流电刺激后在3-back任务上的表现有选择性改善。目前的研究结果为进一步更详细地研究γ-经颅交流电刺激作为一种更具特异性的神经调节方法的作用提供了支持。
