ArticleBrain stimulation
Pairing Speech Sounds With Vagus Nerve Stimulation Drives Stimulus-specific Cortical Plasticity.
Article in Brain stimulation. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 59 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
59 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 102 citations in OpenAlex.
- Auditory processing in rodent models of autism: a systematic review.Journal of neurodevelopmental disorders · 2022Pooled it
- Transcutaneous cervical vagus nerve stimulation improves sensory performance in humans: a randomized controlled crossover pilot study.Scientific reports · 2024Trial
- Effect of transcutaneous cervical vagus nerve stimulation on declarative and working memory in patients with Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD): A pilot study.Journal of affective disorders · 2023Trial
- Quantifying acute physiological biomarkers of transcutaneous cervical vagal nerve stimulation in the context of psychological stress.Brain stimulationTrial
- Vagus Nerve Stimulation Paired With Tones Alters the Auditory Cortex Proteome in a Rat Model of Rett Syndrome.Developmental neurobiology · 2026Article
- Vagus Nerve Stimulation for Neuromodulation: Evolution from Bench to Bedside.Neurology international · 2026Article
- Aging in the Primary Auditory Cortex.Journal of the Association for Research in Otolaryngology : JARO · 2026Review
- Enhanced neural plasticity of the primary visual cortex in visual snow syndrome: evidence from magnetoencephalographic gamma oscillations.Brain communications · 2026Article
- Transcutaneous Auricular Vagus Nerve Stimulation Restores Cognitive Impairment in Morphine-Withdrawn Rats: Role of BDNF and Glial Cells in the Hippocampus.Addiction biology · 2025Article
- Mechanism and Applications of Vagus Nerve Stimulation.Current issues in molecular biology · 2025Review
- Advice for translational neuroscience: move deliberately and build things.Bioelectronic medicine · 2025Article
- Acute and long-term effects of COVID-19 on brain and mental health: A narrative review.Brain, behavior, and immunity · 2025Review
- Speech paired vagus nerve stimulation restores neural sound processing in a rat model of autism.Frontiers in neuroscience · 2025Article
- Article
- Pairing tones with vagus nerve stimulation improves brain stem responses to speech in the valproic acid model of autism.Journal of neurophysiology · 2024Article
- Vagus nerve stimulation during training fails to improve learning in healthy rats.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Article
- Degraded inferior colliculus responses to complex sounds in prenatally exposed VPA rats.Journal of neurodevelopmental disorders · 2024Article
- Higher Dose Noninvasive Transcutaneous Auricular Vagus Nerve Stimulation Increases Feeding Volumes and White Matter Microstructural Complexity in Open-Label Study of Infants Slated for Gastrostomy Tube.The Journal of pediatrics · 2023Article
- Transcutaneous Auricular Vagus Nerve Stimulation Modulates Performance but Not Pupil Size During Nonnative Speech Category Learning.Journal of speech, language, and hearing research : JSLHR · 2023Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundIndividuals with communication disorders, such as aphasia, exhibit weak auditory cortex responses to speech sounds and language impairments. Previous studies have demonstrated that pairing vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) with tones or tone trains can enhance both the spectral and temporal processing of sounds in auditory cortex, and can be used to reverse pathological primary auditory cortex (A1) plasticity in a rodent model of chronic tinnitus. OBJECTIVE/HYPOTHESIS: We predicted that pairing VNS with speech sounds would strengthen the A1 response to the paired speech sounds.
methodsThe speech sounds 'rad' and 'lad' were paired with VNS three hundred times per day for twenty days. A1 responses to both paired and novel speech sounds were recorded 24 h after the last VNS pairing session in anesthetized rats. Response strength, latency and neurometric decoding were compared between VNS speech paired and control rats.
resultsOur results show that VNS paired with speech sounds strengthened the auditory cortex response to the paired sounds, but did not strengthen the amplitude of the response to novel speech sounds. Responses to the paired sounds were faster and less variable in VNS speech paired rats compared to control rats. Neural plasticity that was specific to the frequency, intensity, and temporal characteristics of the paired speech sounds resulted in enhanced neural detection.
conclusionVNS speech sound pairing provides a novel method to enhance speech sound processing in the central auditory system. Delivery of VNS during speech therapy could improve outcomes in individuals with receptive language deficits.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.