corpus callosum binaural beats meditation

This is electroencephalography, or EEG – a fancy word that just means an electric brain graph. By placing electrodes on the scalp, this activity can be amplified, analyzed, and visualized. When many neurons interact in this way at the same time, this activity is strong enough to be detected even outside the brain. When all these neurons are activated they produce electrical pulses – visualize a wave rippling through the crowd at a sports arena – this synchronized electrical activity results in a “brainwave”. Communication happens between them through small electrical currents that travel along the neurons and throughout enormous networks of brain circuits. The brain has billions of neurons, and each individual neuron connects (on average) to thousands of others. Neuroscientists have been studying brainwaves – the popular name for the field of electroencephalography – for nearly a century. While brainwaves can be a figure of speech to describe our thoughts, scientists and clinicians can use literal brainwaves, measured on the head, to help understand the functioning of the human brain.Īs it turns out, the key to having more of these ‘aha’ moments lies in understanding the science behind brainwaves. In between sips of coffee, while out for a walk, or simply indulging your dog in a good belly rub. And typically, it seems to appear out of nowhere. That moment of newfound clarity, a shift in perspective, or a novel idea. All rights reserved.We’ve all experienced that magical feeling of being hit with ‘a brainwave’. Moreover, longitudinal studies are required to address whether the observed callosal effects are induced by meditation or constitute an innate prerequisite for the start or successful continuation of meditation.Ĭopyright © 2012 Elsevier Inc. Such a brain organization might be linked to achieving characteristic mental states and skills as associated with meditation, though this hypothesis requires behavioral confirmation. Thicker callosal regions and enhanced FA in meditators might indicate greater connectivity, possibly reflecting increased hemispheric integration during cerebral processes involving (pre)frontal regions. However, differences achieved significance only when increasing the regional sensitivity of the measurement (i.e., using point-wise measures versus segment-specific measures) and were more prominent for microscopic than macroscopic characteristics (i.e., callosal FA versus callosal thickness). Callosal measures were larger in long-term meditators compared to controls, particularly in anterior callosal sections.

Callosal measures of tract-specific FA were complemented with other global (segment-specific) estimates as well as extremely local (point-wise) measures of callosal micro- and macro-structure. We applied a multimodal imaging approach using diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) in combination with structural magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). To further explore callosal features in the framework of meditation, we analyzed 30 meditators and 30 controls, carefully matched for sex, age, and handedness. Additional effects might exist in other, non-explored callosal regions and/or with respect to callosal attributes not captured by estimates of FA. Prior analyses, however, have focused on estimating mean fractional anisotropy (FA) within two large pre-defined callosal tracts only. Recent findings suggest a close link between long-term meditation practices and the structure of the corpus callosum.

Corpus callosum binaural beats meditation