ReviewPhilosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences2021
Neuromodulation of the mind-wandering brain state: the interaction between neuromodulatory tone, sharp wave-ripples and spontaneous thought.
Review in Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 26 papers.
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Who cites it
26 citing papers in PubMed, 77 citations in OpenAlex.
- Arousal-driven critical roaming reproduces human functional connectivity dynamics.PLoS biology · 2026Article
- Neuromodulation-induced normalization of cortical metastable dynamics signatures in Parkinson's disease.NPJ Parkinson's disease · 2026Article
- Neuromodulators Generate Multiple Context-Relevant Behaviors in Recurrent Neural Networks.Neural computation · 2026Article
- The default mode network: where spontaneous thought meets memory consolidation.Current opinion in behavioral sciences · 2026Article
- Chronic Alcohol Use and Accelerated Brain Aging: Shared Mechanisms with Alzheimer's Disease Pathophysiology.Brain sciences · 2025Review
- Mouse Hippocampal Sharp-Wave Ripple Dataset Curated From Public Neuropixels Datasets.Scientific data · 2025Article
- Mapping cross-modal functional connectivity of major neurotransmitter systems in the human brain.Brain structure & function · 2025Article
- Serotonin Modulation of Dorsoventral Hippocampus in Physiology and Schizophrenia.International journal of molecular sciences · 2025Review
- Oscillations of the Wandering Mind: Neural Evidence for Distinct Exploration/Exploitation Strategies in Younger and Older Adults.Human brain mapping · 2025Article
- Visual hallucinations in Parkinson's disease: spotlight on central cholinergic dysfunction.Brain : a journal of neurology · 2025Review
- On the varieties of conscious experiences: Altered Beliefs Under Psychedelics (ALBUS).Neuroscience of consciousness · 2025Article
- Opposite serotonergic modulation of sharp waves in the dorsal and ventral hippocampus.Frontiers in synaptic neuroscience · 2025Article
- Dopamine alters functional gradients in Parkinson's disease.Imaging neuroscience (Cambridge, Mass.) · 2025Article
- Hippocampal sharp-wave ripples correlate with periods of naturally occurring self-generated thoughts in humans.Nature communications · 2024Article
- Sleep spindle architecture associated with distinct clinical phenotypes in older adults at risk for dementia.Molecular psychiatry · 2024Article
- Individual variability in neural representations of mind-wandering.Network neuroscience (Cambridge, Mass.) · 2024Article
- Convergent functional change of frontoparietal network in obsessive-compulsive disorder: a voxel-based meta-analysis.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2024Review
- Modeling the contribution of theta-gamma coupling to sequential memory, imagination, and dreaming.Frontiers in neural circuits · 2024Article
- Recent advances in the neuroscience of spontaneous and off-task thought: implications for mental health.Nature. Mental health · 2023Article
- Echoes from Intrinsic Connectivity Networks in the Subcortex.The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2023Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
3 authors at 1 institution in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Mind-wandering has become a captivating topic for cognitive neuroscientists. By now, it is reasonably well described in terms of its phenomenology and the large-scale neural networks that support it. However, we know very little about what neurobiological mechanisms trigger a mind-wandering episode and sustain the mind-wandering brain state. Here, we focus on the role of ascending neuromodulatory systems (i.e. acetylcholine, noradrenaline, serotonin and dopamine) in shaping mind-wandering. We advance the hypothesis that the hippocampal sharp wave-ripple (SWR) is a compelling candidate for a brain state that can trigger mind-wandering episodes. This hippocampal rhythm, which occurs spontaneously in quiescent behavioural states, is capable of propagating widespread activity in the default network and is functionally associated with recollective, associative, imagination and simulation processes. The occurrence of the SWR is heavily dependent on hippocampal neuromodulatory tone. We describe how the interplay of neuromodulators may promote the hippocampal SWR and trigger mind-wandering episodes. We then identify the global neuromodulatory signatures that shape the evolution of the mind-wandering brain state. Under our proposed framework, mind-wandering emerges due to the interplay between neuromodulatory systems that influence the transitions between brain states, which either facilitate, or impede, a wandering mind. This article is part of the theme issue 'Offline perception: voluntary and spontaneous perceptual experiences without matching external stimulation'.
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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.