Bidirectionally connected cores in a mouse connectome: Towards extracting the brain subnetworks essential for consciousness
bioRxiv Preprint Server July 12, 2021 Jun Kitazono, Yuma Aoki, Masafumi Oizumi preprint
A method for hierarchically decomposing a brain network into cores based on the strength of bidirectional connections helps identify regions likely essential for consciousness. Applied to a whole-brain mouse connectome, cores with strong bidirectional connections included the isocortex, thalamus, and claustrum—areas thought to support consciousness—and excluded the cerebellum, which is not considered relevant. Simpler methods that ignore bidirectionality failed to show this correspondence. The findings suggest that analyzing bidirectional connectivity offers a novel way to relate brain network structure to consciousness.