Xenon and nitrous oxide induced changes in resting EEG activity can be explained by systematic increases in the relaxation rates of stochastically driven alpha band oscillatory activity.
Journal of neural engineering April 11, 2025 Rick Evertz, Andria Pelentritou, John Cormack et al.
Resting EEG activity typically resembles a filtered random process, and alpha band (8-13 Hz) oscillations can be modeled as independent, stochastically driven relaxation oscillators. This study tested whether changes in alpha band power and spectral slope during anesthesia with xenon and nitrous oxide—both NMDA receptor antagonists—could be explained by alterations in the distribution of alpha band damping rates. In participants receiving step-level increases of xenon (n=24) or nitrous oxide (n=20), both agents produced dose-dependent reductions in alpha power and spectral slope (15-40 Hz), accounted for by increased mean alpha band damping.