Trial reportBiological psychiatry. Cognitive neuroscience and neuroimaging2022
Reduction in Left Frontal Alpha Oscillations by Transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation in Major Depressive Disorder Is Context Dependent in a Randomized Clinical Trial.
Trial report in Biological psychiatry. Cognitive neuroscience and neuroimaging, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 33 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
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.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
33 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 25 citations in OpenAlex.
- Status and trends of TMS research in depressive disorder: a bibliometric and visual analysis.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2024Pooled it
- Transcranial alternating current stimulation for neuropsychiatric disorders: a systematic review of treatment parameters and outcomes.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2024Pooled it
- Adjunctive transcranial alternating current stimulation for patients with major depressive disorder: A systematic review and meta-analysis.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2023Pooled it
- Sustained benefits of closed-loop transcranial alternating current stimulation (CL-tACS) on depression: a 12-week open-label clinical trial.European archives of psychiatry and clinical neuroscience · 2026Article
- Efficacy and safety of adjunctive transcranial alternating current stimulation in bipolar depression: A randomized controlled trial.Molecular psychiatry · 2026Article
- Mechanisms and clinical applications of transcranial alternating current stimulation in the treatment of neuropsychiatric disorders: Current evidence and future directions.Chinese medical journal · 2026Review
- α -tACS Modulates Reward-Dependent Pupil Responses and Corticostriatal Connectivity.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation in Major Depressive Disorder: From Bench to Bedside-A Scoping Review of Neurobiological Mechanisms and Clinical Translation.Bioengineering (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- Intensity-dependent tACS entrainment effects in a cortical microcircuit: a computational study.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Physical Therapy for Treatment-Resistant Depression A Comprehensive Review of Efficacy, Safety, and Evidence Grading.Neuropsychiatric disease and treatment · 2026Review
- Review
- Bifocal tACS over the primary sensorimotor cortices increases interhemispheric inhibition and improves bimanual dexterity.Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991) · 2025Article
- Neuroplastic effects of transcranial alternating current stimulation (tACS): from mechanisms to clinical trials.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2025Review
- Right Frontal Gamma Transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation Modulates Optimism Biases.Neuroscience bulletin · 2025Article
- Shared oscillatory mechanisms of alpha-band activity in prefrontal regions in eyes open and closed state using a portable EEG acquisition device.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Application of Transcranial Direct and Alternating Current Stimulation (tDCS and tACS) on Major Depressive Disorder.Advances in experimental medicine and biology · 2024Review
- Target engagement of the subgenual anterior cingulate cortex with transcranial temporal interference stimulation in major depressive disorder: a protocol for a randomized sham-controlled trial.Frontiers in neuroscience · 2024Article
- Article
- Restoring Coordination to Systems of Nonidentical Oscillators Through Third Party Pacing.AIP conference proceedings · 2023Article
- Mental Activity as the Bridge between Neural Biomarkers and Symptoms of Psychiatric Illness.Clinical EEG and neuroscience · 2023Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundLeft frontal alpha oscillations are associated with decreased approach motivation and have been proposed as a target for noninvasive brain stimulation for the treatment of depression and anhedonia. Indeed, transcranial alternating current stimulation (tACS) at the alpha frequency reduced left frontal alpha power and was associated with a higher response rate than placebo stimulation in patients with major depressive disorder (MDD) in a recent double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial.
methodsIn this current study, we aimed to replicate successful target engagement by delineating the effects of a single session of bifrontal tACS at the individualized alpha frequency (IAF-tACS) on alpha oscillations in patients with MDD. Eighty-four participants were randomized to receive verum or sham IAF-tACS. Electrical brain activity was recorded during rest and while viewing emotionally salient images before and after stimulation to investigate whether the modulation of alpha oscillation by tACS exhibited specificity with regard to valence.
resultsIn agreement with the previous study of tACS in MDD, we found that a single session of bifrontal IAF-tACS reduced left frontal alpha power during the resting state when compared with placebo. Furthermore, the reduction of left frontal alpha oscillation by tACS was specific for stimuli with positive valence. In contrast, these effects on left frontal alpha power were not found in healthy control participants.
conclusionsTogether, these results support an important role of tACS in reducing left frontal alpha oscillations as a future treatment for MDD.
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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.