Non-invasive brain stimulation shows promise for neurological therapy

Neurological disorders including addiction, depression, and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) are often characterised by complex pathologies involving multiple brain regions and circuits.

These conditions are difficult to treat due to the intricate and poorly understood nature of brain functions and the challenge of delivering therapies to deep brain structures without invasive procedures.

Now, an interdisciplinary team of researchers led by Friedhelm Hummel and postdoc Pierre Vassiliadis are pioneering transcranial Temporal Interference Electric Stimulation (tTIS). The method targets deep brain regions that are the control centres of several important cognitive functions and involved in different neurological and psychiatric pathologies. The research is detailed in Nature Human Behaviour.

“Invasive deep brain stimulation [DBS] has already successfully been applied to the deeply seated neural control centres in order to curb addiction and treat Parkinson, OCD or depression,” Hummel said in a statement. “The key difference with our approach is that it is non-invasive, meaning that we use low-level electrical stimulation on the scalp to target these regions.”