BACKGROUND A brain-computer interface could potentially enhance the various benefits of sleep. NEW METHOD We describe a strategy for enhancing slow-wave sleep (SWS) by stimulating the sleeping brain with periodic acoustic stimuli that produce resonance in the form of enhanced slow-wave activity in the electroencephalogram (EEG). The system delivers each acoustic stimulus at a particular phase...

OBJECTIVE The present study aimed to measure bimodal benefits and probe their underlying mechanisms in Mandarin-speaking cochlear implant (CI) subjects who had contralateral residual acoustic hearing. DESIGN The subjects recognised words or phonemes from the Mandarin Lexical Neighborhood Test in noise at a 10-dB signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) with acoustic stimulation, electric stimulation or th...

Frequency difference limens were determined as a function of reference-stimulus level for pulsatile electrical stimuli in 5 postlingually deaf human subjects with Nucleus-22 cochlear implants and for sinusoidally amplitude-modulated acoustic white noise stimuli in 4 normal-hearing humans. Subjects were tested at levels throughout the dynamic range and extending to the lowest detectable levels. ...

Significance Sensory processing depends upon the integration of widely distributed neural assemblies. During every day listening, our ears receive different information (due to interaural time and amplitude differences) it is known that both hemispheres extract acoustic features. Nonetheless, features belonging same source become integrated. It has been suggested brain overcomes this “binding p...

Slow oscillations are electrical potential oscillations with a spectral peak frequency of ∼0.8 Hz, and hallmark the electroencephalogram during slow-wave sleep. Recent studies have indicated a causal contribution of slow oscillations to the consolidation of memories during slow-wave sleep, raising the question to what extent such oscillations can be induced by external stimulation. Here, we exa...

This study investigates the spatial profile and the temporal latency of the brain stimulation induced by the transcranial application of pulsed focused ultrasound (FUS). The site of neuromodulation was detected using 2-deoxy-2-[¹⁸F]fluoro-D-glucose PET immediately after FUS sonication on the unilateral thalamic area of Sprague-Dawley rats. The latency of the stimulation was estimated by measuri...

Focused ultrasound (FUS) has recently been investigated as a new mode of non-invasive brain stimulation, which offers exquisite spatial resolution and depth control. We report on the elicitation of explicit somatosensory sensations as well as accompanying evoked electroencephalographic (EEG) potentials induced by FUS stimulation of the human somatosensory cortex. As guided by individual-specifi...

Acoustic studies have revealed that patients with Essential Tremor treated with thalamic Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) may suffer from speech deterioration in terms of imprecise oral articulation and reduced voicing control. Based on the acoustic signal one cannot infer, however, whether this deterioration is due to a general slowing down of the speech motor system (e.g., a target undershoot of ...

The standard method to determine the output level of acoustic and mechanical stimulation to the inner ear is measurement of vibration response of the stapes in human cadaveric temporal bones (TBs) by laser Doppler vibrometry. However, this method is reliable only if the intact ossicular chain is stimulated. For other stimulation modes an alternative method is needed. The differential intracochl...