Existence of multiple transitions of the critical state due to anesthetics.
Nature communications August 15, 2024 Davor Curic, Donovan M Ashby, Alexander McGirr et al. 9 citations
Brain activity during quiet wakefulness exhibits scale-free patterns of coordinated neuronal firing, thought to reflect a universal operating mechanism. This study examined how three common anesthetics—isoflurane, pentobarbital, and ketamine—at multiple doses alter these patterns in the mouse cortex using calcium imaging. Low doses largely preserved scale-free statistics, but surgical-plane anesthesia disrupted critical avalanche dynamics, producing multiple abnormal modes. The findings reveal distinct pathways away from the default critical state, depending on the anesthetic and individual responses, suggesting a complex relationship between criticality and consciousness.