Capacity for consciousness under ketamine anaesthesia is selectively associated with activity in posteromedial cortex in rats
Neuroscience of Consciousness January 1, 2022 A. Arena, B. E. Juel, R. Comolatti et al.
Activity in the posteromedial cortex correlates with the brain's capacity for consciousness, as measured by the Perturbational Complexity Index state-transition (PCIST), during different depths of ketamine anaesthesia in rats, independently of behaviour. PCIST was only slightly reduced from wakefulness to light anaesthesia but dropped significantly with deeper anaesthesia. The high-dose effect was selectively associated with reduced high frequency/low frequency ratio in the posteromedial cortex, which strongly correlated with PCIST. Behavioural unresponsiveness from light anaesthesia was associated with similar spectral changes in frontal, not posterior, regions.