PLoS ONE
August 28, 2013
Fabio Ferrarelli, Richard Smith, Daniela Dentico et al.
125 citations
Long-term Buddhist meditators with about 8,700 mean lifetime hours of practice show increased gamma power (25-40 Hz) in parietal-occipital regions during non-rapid eye movement sleep compared to meditation-naive individuals. This increase is specific to gamma frequencies, unrelated to spontaneous arousal levels during NREM sleep, and positively correlated with the length of lifetime daily meditation practice. The findings indicate that meditation practice produces measurable changes in spontaneous brain activity and suggest that EEG gamma activity during sleep may serve as a sensitive marker of long-lasting plastic effects of meditative training on brain function.
Scientific Reports
August 19, 2019
Cole Korponay, Daniela Dentico, Tammi R. A. Kral et al.
49 citations
An eight-week mindfulness intervention did not reduce impulsivity on the go/no-go task or Barratt Impulsiveness Scale (BIS-11), nor produce changes in neural correlates such as frontostriatal gray matter, functional connectivity, or dopamine levels compared to active or wait-list control groups. Long-term meditators (LTMs) did not differ from meditation-naïve participants (MNPs) on the go/no-go task, but LTMs self-reported lower attentional impulsivity and higher motor and non-planning impulsivity on the BIS-11. LTMs had less striatal gray matter, greater cortico-striatal-thalamic functional connectivity, and lower spontaneous eye-blink rate than MNPs. Total lifetime practice hours did not significantly relate to impulsivity or neurobiological metrics, suggesting pre-existing differences may account for group differences.
PLoS ONE
February 22, 2016
Daniela Dentico, Fabio Ferrarelli, Brady A. Riedner et al.
43 citations
After two intensive days of mindfulness or compassion meditation, long-term meditators showed increased low-frequency brain activity (1-12 Hz, peaking around 7-8 Hz) over prefrontal and left parietal areas during non-rapid eye movement sleep. This increase was strongest early in the night and extended to higher frequencies (25-40 Hz) during the third sleep cycle. The changes depended on meditation experience and did not differ between the two meditation styles. No such changes occurred in meditation-naive individuals. The findings suggest that intensive meditation practice acutely alters brain activity in regions linked to top-down regulation, complementing chronic changes seen in posterior areas.
European Journal of Neuroscience
August 24, 2018
Daniela Dentico, David R. W. Bachhuber, Brady A. Riedner et al.
18 citations
Long-term meditators showed increased low- and fast-frequency brain oscillations during wakefulness after two 8-hour sessions of mindfulness or compassion-and-loving-kindness meditation, peaking at 8 and 15 Hz over prefrontal and left centro-parietal electrodes. These waking changes correlated with previously observed meditation-related increases in low-frequency NREM sleep EEG activity (4-12 Hz), particularly in the theta-alpha range. The findings suggest that sleep homeostatic response alone cannot explain the post-meditation sleep changes; instead, a reverberation of meditation-related processes during subsequent sleep may be involved. No differences emerged between meditation styles or in meditation-naïve participants.