Transcranial Ultrasonic Neuromodulation of Primary Visual Cortex and Primary Auditory Cortex in Humans

Summary

There are a number of disorders of the brain that have limited treatment options, such as chronic pain, addiction, and major depression. A new technology has emerged in the last decade known as transcranial focused ultrasound, which can deliver focused acoustic signals through the skull to modulate brain activity over a small region, including structures deep in the brain. This has resulted in many ongoing clinical trials for various disorders, but there is still a lack of understanding of the optimal sonication parameters for increasing versus decreasing brain activity. The investigators aim to address this open question by sonicating the primary visual cortex and primary auditory cortex in human with a range of sonication parameters. These brain structures were chosen to target because they are expected to elicit perceptual responses in the subject (i.e., the subject will report visual and auditory perception during sonication), allowing the experimenters to infer directly the extent to which neural signals can propagate through the visual and auditory systems in a way that is sufficient to produce conscious perception. Such findings have applications not only in clinical treatments, but also in the fundamental science of the neural basis of sensory perception. Previous work has shown that sonicating the visual cortex in humans can elicit visual perception, but the ultrasonic system in prior work did not have the focusing capabilities that will be employed in this study. At the end of this study, the investigators will have determined the optimal sonication parameters that can elicit neural responses over a small volume over sensory cortex, which can be inferred from visual percepts being localized in space (e.g., a bright spot as opposed to a diffuse light), and auditory percepts that sound like pure tones rather than a broad set of frequencies (e.g., sounding like white noise or static).

Conditions

• Healthy Volunteers
• no Condition, Basic Science

Interventions

DEVICE

Transcranial Focused Ultrasound Stimulation

Low-intensity transcranial focused ultrasound delivered to either the primary visual cortex or primary auditory cortex using a research ultrasound system. Three pulse durations are tested in randomized order during a single study session while brain activity and behavioral responses are measured.

DEVICE

Electroencephalography

Noninvasive recording of brain electrical activity from scalp electrodes before, during, and after ultrasound stimulation.

DEVICE

Magnetic Resonance Imaging

Structural and functional magnetic resonance imaging used for anatomical localization of stimulation targets and follow-up safety assessment.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• MIT Lincoln Laboratory

  collaborator UNKNOWN

• Massachusetts Institute of Technology

  lead OTHER

Study Design

Allocation

NA

Purpose

BASIC_SCIENCE

Masking

NONE

Model

SINGLE_GROUP

Eligibility

Min Age

21 Years

Max Age

55 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2026-05-01

Primary Completion

2026-11-18

Completion

2027-06-01

Countries

• United States

Study Locations