Electrical modulation of cerebral cortex activity: Mechanisms and applications

Abstract

To further understand the mechanisms underlying non-invasive brain stimulation techniques we studied the modulatory effect of electric fields in vitro in cortical slices that express slow oscillations (<1Hz). We found a that a fine control of the emergent oscillatory frequency can be obtained by means of regulation of the intensity and direction of the electric field. Besides this, electric fields influence the propagation behavior of slow oscillations and display a strong impact on the horizontal speed and on the regularity of the oscillation.