Xiao Jinming, Yin Qing, Li Lei, Meng Yao, Liu Xiaobo, Hu Wanrou, Huang Xinyue, Feng Yu, Shan Xiaolong, Zhao Weixing, Wang Peng, Wang Xiaotian, Li Youyi, Chen Huafu, Duan Xujun
Sichuan Provincial Center for Mental Health, Sichuan Provincial People's Hospital, School of Life Science and Technology, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, PR China.
MOE Key Lab for Neuro information, High-Field Magnetic Resonance Brain Imaging Key Laboratory of Sichuan Province, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, PR China.
PLoS Comput Biol. 2025 Jul 28;21(7):e1013316. doi: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1013316. eCollection 2025 Jul.
Exploring how local perturbations of cortical activity propagate across the brain network not only helps us understanding causal mechanisms of brain networks, but also offers a network insight into neurobiological mechanisms for transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) treatment response. The concurrent combination of TMS and electroencephalography (EEG) enables researchers to track the TMS-evoked activity, defined here as scalp-recorded electrical signals reflecting the brain's response to TMS, with millisecond-level temporal resolution. Based on this technique, we proposed a quantitative framework which combined sparse non-negative matrix factorization and stage-dependent effective connectivity methods to infer the causal pathways in TMS-evoked brain responses. We found that single-pulse TMS firstly induces local activity in the directly stimulated regions (left primary motor cortex, M1), and then propagates to the contralateral hemisphere and other brain regions. Finally, it propagates back from the contralateral region (right M1) to the stimulation region (left M1). This study provides preliminary evidence demonstrating how local perturbations propagate through brain networks to influence various cortical regions, and offers insights into the neural mechanism of TMS-evoked brain responses from a network perspective.
探索皮质活动的局部扰动如何在脑网络中传播，不仅有助于我们理解脑网络的因果机制，还能从网络角度深入了解经颅磁刺激（TMS）治疗反应的神经生物学机制。TMS与脑电图（EEG）的同步结合，使研究人员能够以毫秒级的时间分辨率追踪TMS诱发的活动，在此定义为头皮记录的反映大脑对TMS反应的电信号。基于该技术，我们提出了一个定量框架，该框架结合了稀疏非负矩阵分解和阶段依赖有效连接性方法，以推断TMS诱发的脑反应中的因果路径。我们发现，单脉冲TMS首先在直接受刺激区域（左侧初级运动皮层，M1）诱发局部活动，然后传播到对侧半球和其他脑区。最后，它从对侧区域（右侧M1）传播回刺激区域（左侧M1）。本研究提供了初步证据，证明局部扰动如何通过脑网络传播以影响各个皮质区域，并从网络角度深入了解TMS诱发的脑反应的神经机制。
