Our laboratory is part of the Institute for Translational Neuroscience and affiliated with Departments of Neurology, Neuroscience, and Radiology.

Perceptual Awareness

• Lua Koenig and Biyu J. He. Spontaneous slow cortical potentials and brain oscillations independently influence conscious visual perception. PLoS Biology. 2025 Jan; 23(1): e3002964.
• Spatiotemporal neural dynamics of object recognition under uncertainty in humans, eLife, 2023
• Frequency-specific neural signatures of perceptual content and perceptual stability, eLife, 2022
• Long-term priors influence visual perception through recruitment of long-range feedback, Nature Communications, 2021
• Cortical and subcortical signatures of conscious object recognition, Nature Communications, 2021
• A dual role of prestimulus spontaneous neural activity in visual object recognition, Nature Communications, 2019
• Initial-state-dependent, robust, transient neural dynamics encode conscious visual perception, PLoS Computational Biology, 2017
• Modulating Conscious Movement Intention by Noninvasive Brain Stimulation and the Underlying Neural Mechanisms, Journal of Neuroscience, 2015
• Spatiotemporal Dissociation of Brain Activity underlying Subjective Awareness, Objective Performance and Confidence, Journal of Neuroscience, 2014
• Brain mechanisms for simple perception and bistable perception, PNAS, 2013

Priors in Perception/One-Shot Perceptual Learning

• Long-term priors influence visual perception through recruitment of long-range feedback, Nature Communications, 2021
• One-trial perceptual learning in the absence of conscious remembering and independent of the medial temporal lobe, PNAS, 2021
• A Gradient of Sharpening Effects by Perceptual Prior across the Human Cortical Hierarchy, Journal of Neuroscience, 2021
• Neural dynamics of visual ambiguity resolution by perceptual prior, eLife, 2019
• Content-specific activity in frontoparietal and default-mode networks during prior-guided visual perception, eLife, 2018
• Unconsciously Elicited Perceptual Prior, Neuroscience of Consciousness, 2016

1/f Aperiodic Brain Activity and Its Functional Roles

• Neural integration underlying naturalistic prediction flexibly adapts to varying sensory input rate, Nature Communications, 2021
• Neural Integration of Stimulus History Underlies Prediction for Naturalistically Evolving Sequences, Journal of Neuroscience, 2018
• Random Recurrent Networks Near Criticality Capture the Broadband Power Distribution of Human ECoG Dynamics, Cerebral Cortex, 2017
• Scale-Free Neural and Physiological Dynamics in Naturalistic Stimuli Processing, eNeuro, 2016
• Scale-Free Properties of the Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging Signal during Rest and Task, Journal of Neuroscience, 2011
• The temporal structures and functional significance of scale-free brain activity, Neuron, 2010

How Spontaneous Activity Influences Task Processing

• Spectral signature and behavioral consequence of spontaneous shifts of pupil-linked arousal in human, eLife, 2021
• Average is Optimal: An Inverted-U Relationship between Trial-to-Trial Brain Activity and Behavioral Performance, PLoS Computational Biology, 2013
• Spontaneous and Task-Evoked Brain Activity Negatively Interact, Journal of Neuroscience, 2013

Reviews

• Next frontiers in consciousness research, Neuron, 2023
• Towards a pluralistic neurobiological understanding of consciousness, Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 2023
• Spontaneous Perception: a framework for task-free, self-paced perception, Neuroscience of Consciousness, 2021
• Neuromodulation of brain state and behavior, Annual Reviews of Neuroscience, 2020
• Beyond trial-based paradigms: Continuous behavior, ongoing neural activity, and natural stimuli, Journal of Neuroscience, 2018
• Robust, transient neural dynamics during conscious perception, Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 2018
• Volition and action in the human brain: processes, pathologies, and reasons, Journal of Neuroscience, 2017
• Scale-free brain activity: past, present and future, Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 2014
• The fMRI signal, slow cortical potential and consciousness, Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 2009