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Effects of LSD on music-evoked brain activity

Mendel Kaelen, Romy Lorenz, Frederick Barrett, Leor Roseman, Csaba Orban, Andre Santos-Ribeiro, Matthew B Wall, Amanda Feilding, David Nutt, Suresh Muthukumaraswamy, Robin Carhart-Harris, Robert Leech
doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/153031
Mendel Kaelen
1 Centre for Neuropsychopharmacology, Department of Medicine, Imperial College London, London W12 0NN, UK
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Romy Lorenz
2 Computational, Cognitive and Clinical Neuroscience Laboratory (C3NL), Department of Medicine, Imperial College London, London W12 0NN, UK
3 Department of Bioengineering, Imperial College London, SW7 2AZ, UK
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Frederick Barrett
4 Behavioral Pharmacology Research Unit, John Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore, USA
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Leor Roseman
1 Centre for Neuropsychopharmacology, Department of Medicine, Imperial College London, London W12 0NN, UK
2 Computational, Cognitive and Clinical Neuroscience Laboratory (C3NL), Department of Medicine, Imperial College London, London W12 0NN, UK
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Csaba Orban
1 Centre for Neuropsychopharmacology, Department of Medicine, Imperial College London, London W12 0NN, UK
2 Computational, Cognitive and Clinical Neuroscience Laboratory (C3NL), Department of Medicine, Imperial College London, London W12 0NN, UK
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Andre Santos-Ribeiro
1 Centre for Neuropsychopharmacology, Department of Medicine, Imperial College London, London W12 0NN, UK
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Matthew B Wall
5 Imanova Centre for Imaging Sciences, Hammersmith Hospital, London W12, UK
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Amanda Feilding
6 The Beckley Foundation, Oxford OX3 9SY, UK
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David Nutt
1 Centre for Neuropsychopharmacology, Department of Medicine, Imperial College London, London W12 0NN, UK
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Suresh Muthukumaraswamy
7 Schools of Pharmacy and Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland 1142, New Zealand
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Robin Carhart-Harris
1 Centre for Neuropsychopharmacology, Department of Medicine, Imperial College London, London W12 0NN, UK
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Robert Leech
2 Computational, Cognitive and Clinical Neuroscience Laboratory (C3NL), Department of Medicine, Imperial College London, London W12 0NN, UK
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Abstract

Music is a highly dynamic stimulus, and consists of distinct acoustic features, such as pitch, rhythm and timbre. Neuroimaging studies highlight a hierarchy of brain networks involved in music perception. Psychedelic drugs such as lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) temporary disintegrate the normal hierarchy of brain functioning, and produce profound subjective effects, including enhanced music-evoked emotion. The primary objective of this study was to investigate the acute effects of LSD on music-evoked brain-activity under naturalistic music listening conditions. 16 healthy participants were enrolled in magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) while listening to a 7-minute music piece under eyes-closed conditions on two separate visits (LSD (75 mcg) and placebo). Dynamic time courses for acoustic features were extracted from the music excerpts, and were entered into subject-level fMRI analyses as regressors of interest. Differences between conditions were assessed at group level subsequently, and were related to changes in music-evoked emotions via correlation analyses. Psycho-physiological interactions (PPIs) were carried out to further interrogate underlying music-specific changes in functional connectivity under LSD. Results showed pronounced cortical and subcortical changes in music-evoked brain activity under LSD. Most notable changes in brain activity and connectivity were associated with the component timbral complexity, representing the complexity of the music’s spectral distribution, and these occurred in brain networks previously identified for music-perception and music-evoked emotion, and showed an association with enhanced music-evoked feelings of wonder under LSD. The findings shed light on how the brain processes music under LSD, and provide a neurobiological basis for the usefulness of music in psychedelic therapy.

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Posted June 25, 2017.
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Effects of LSD on music-evoked brain activity
Mendel Kaelen, Romy Lorenz, Frederick Barrett, Leor Roseman, Csaba Orban, Andre Santos-Ribeiro, Matthew B Wall, Amanda Feilding, David Nutt, Suresh Muthukumaraswamy, Robin Carhart-Harris, Robert Leech
bioRxiv 153031; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/153031
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Effects of LSD on music-evoked brain activity
Mendel Kaelen, Romy Lorenz, Frederick Barrett, Leor Roseman, Csaba Orban, Andre Santos-Ribeiro, Matthew B Wall, Amanda Feilding, David Nutt, Suresh Muthukumaraswamy, Robin Carhart-Harris, Robert Leech
bioRxiv 153031; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/153031

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