Modulated Neuronal Activity and Connectivity of Smoking Resist Using Real-Time fMRI Neurofeedback

Recent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) technique with real-time (rt) feedback has widely been adopted to regulate one’s own neuronal activity within regions-of-interest (ROIs). Despite the fact that the functional connectivity (FC) between ROIs has also been modulated via rt-fMRI neurofeedback (NF), however there is no study to explicitly provide the FC patterns in addition to neuronal activity levels during rt-fMRI NF trials. In this study, we adopted both neuronal activities within an ROI and FC patterns between ROIs to investigate a potential utility of the FC information. Fourteen heavy smokers could voluntarily control their brain activity based on the neurofeedback of both neuronal activation within an ROI related to smoking resist and FC patterns between ROIs. Our proposed rt-fMRI method appears to modulate not only the neuronal activity but also the neuronal connectivity levels.