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Relating Alpha Power and Phase to Population Firing and Hemodynamic Activity Using a Thalamo-cortical Neural Mass Model.

  • Becker R Functional Brain Mapping Lab, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland.
  • Knock S Institut de Neurosciences des Systèmes, Aix Marseille Université, Marseille, France.
  • Ritter P Minerva Research Group BrainModes, Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany; Dept. Neurology, Charité & Bernstein Center for Computational Neuroscience-University Medicine, Berlin, Germany; Berlin School of Mind and Brain & Mind and Brain Institute, Humboldt University, Berlin, Germany.
  • Jirsa V Institut de Neurosciences des Systèmes, Aix Marseille Université, Marseille, France; Inserm, UMR 1106, Aix Marseille Université, Marseille, France.
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  • 2015-09-04
Published in:
  • PLoS computational biology. - 2015
Alpha Rhythm
Computational Biology
Electroencephalography
Hemodynamics
Humans
Magnetic Resonance Imaging
Models, Neurological
Thalamus
Visual Cortex
English Oscillations are ubiquitous phenomena in the animal and human brain. Among them, the alpha rhythm in human EEG is one of the most prominent examples. However, its precise mechanisms of generation are still poorly understood. It was mainly this lack of knowledge that motivated a number of simultaneous electroencephalography (EEG) - functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies. This approach revealed how oscillatory neuronal signatures such as the alpha rhythm are paralleled by changes of the blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) signal. Several such studies revealed a negative correlation between the alpha rhythm and the hemodynamic BOLD signal in visual cortex and a positive correlation in the thalamus. In this study we explore the potential generative mechanisms that lead to those observations. We use a bursting capable Stefanescu-Jirsa 3D (SJ3D) neural-mass model that reproduces a wide repertoire of prominent features of local neuronal-population dynamics. We construct a thalamo-cortical network of coupled SJ3D nodes considering excitatory and inhibitory directed connections. The model suggests that an inverse correlation between cortical multi-unit activity, i.e. the firing of neuronal populations, and narrow band local field potential oscillations in the alpha band underlies the empirically observed negative correlation between alpha-rhythm power and fMRI signal in visual cortex. Furthermore the model suggests that the interplay between tonic and bursting mode in thalamus and cortex is critical for this relation. This demonstrates how biophysically meaningful modelling can generate precise and testable hypotheses about the underpinnings of large-scale neuroimaging signals.
Language
  • English
Open access status
gold
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Persistent URL
https://folia.unifr.ch/global/documents/214736
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