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What anaesthesia reveals about human brains and consciousness

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The combination of general anaesthesia and neuroimaging holds unique potential for catalysing integrative and translational discovery about human brains and consciousness. By spanning molecular, cognitive and clinical neuroscience, anaesthesia provides a bridge from molecules to mind across species.

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Fig. 1: The potential of general anaesthesia in neuroscience.
Fig. 2: Different anaesthetics induce similar increases of structure–function coupling.

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Acknowledgements

The author is grateful for the mentorship of E. Stamatakis, D. Menon and B. Misic, whose insights about anaesthesia, consciousness and structure–function relationships in the brain have greatly shaped his own. The author is also grateful to J. Hansen and E. Ceballos for helpful feedback on the manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychiatry and Centre for Eudaimonia and Human Flourishing, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK

    Andrea I. Luppi

  2. Division of Anaesthesia, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK

    Andrea I. Luppi

  3. St John’s College, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK

    Andrea I. Luppi

  4. Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada

    Andrea I. Luppi

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  1. Andrea I. Luppi
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Correspondence to Andrea I. Luppi.

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Luppi, A.I. What anaesthesia reveals about human brains and consciousness. Nat Hum Behav 8, 801–804 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-024-01860-5

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