Human high-order thalamic nuclei gate conscious perception through the thalamofrontal loop.
Science (New York, N.Y.) April 4, 2025 Zepeng Fang, Yuanyuan Dang, An'An Ping et al. 45 citations
The intralaminar and medial thalamic nuclei act as a gate to drive prefrontal cortex activity during the emergence of conscious perception. In patients with implanted electrodes performing a visual consciousness task, these nuclei showed earlier and stronger consciousness-related activity compared to ventral nuclei and prefrontal cortex. Transient thalamofrontal neural synchrony and cross-frequency coupling were driven by the θ phase of the intralaminar and medial nuclei during conscious perception.