Quantitative characterization of neurovascular coupling underlying vasomotion

Determine the quantitative aspects of neurovascular coupling that link neuronal activity to arteriole vasomotor oscillations by experimentally characterizing undriven vasomotor dynamics when neuronal activity is transiently suppressed, in order to inform models of entrainment and synchronization in spatially non-homogeneous oscillatory media.

Background

The paper studies synchronization, defects, and parcellation in non-homogeneous oscillatory media using a Ginzburg-Landau model with a spatial gradient of natural frequencies, motivated by physiological systems such as cortical vasomotion and peristalsis.

For vasomotion, the authors argue that neural stimulation acts as an external drive for arteriole oscillations, suggesting that insights from forced versions of the Ginzburg-Landau equation may apply. However, they note that the quantitative properties of neurovascular coupling are not established and emphasize the need for targeted experiments, specifically proposing transient suppression of neuronal activity to measure undriven vasomotor dynamics and thereby constrain models.