[ExI] Possible seat of consciousness found

Stuart LaForge avant at sollegro.com
Sat Feb 15 18:31:13 UTC 2020


Quoting William Flynn Wallace:

> Perhaps they stimulated the ascending reticular activating system?  RAS.

They specifically targeted the central lateral thalamus by using an  
array of 24 superfine (12.5 micrometer) electrodes and were guided by  
hi resolution imaging technology, so I have to assume that their  
anatomical targeting was precise. But according to their introduction,  
the CL thalamus is directly connected to the RAS so maybe there was  
some current leakage to the RAS? I don't know. The article is free to  
download if you want to judge for yourself:

"However, the central lateral thalamus (CL) may have a special  
relation to consciousness. CL damage is linked to disorders of  
consciousness (Schiff, 2008). Anatomically, CL receives input from the  
brainstem reticular activating system. It also projects to superficial  
layers and reciprocally connects with deep layers of the  
frontoparietal cortex (Kaufman and Rosenquist, 1985, Purpura and  
Schiff, 1997, Towns et al., 1990). Thus, CL is well positioned to  
influence information flow between cortical layers and areas."

from  
https://www.cell.com/neuron/fulltext/S0896-6273(20)30005-2#secsectitle0020

Stuart LaForge




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