Cargando…

Integrated information structure collapses with anesthetic loss of conscious arousal in Drosophila melanogaster

The physical basis of consciousness remains one of the most elusive concepts in current science. One influential conjecture is that consciousness is to do with some form of causality, measurable through information. The integrated information theory of consciousness (IIT) proposes that conscious exp...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Leung, Angus, Cohen, Dror, van Swinderen, Bruno, Tsuchiya, Naotsugu
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7946294/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33635858
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1008722
_version_ 1783663024099295232
author Leung, Angus
Cohen, Dror
van Swinderen, Bruno
Tsuchiya, Naotsugu
author_facet Leung, Angus
Cohen, Dror
van Swinderen, Bruno
Tsuchiya, Naotsugu
author_sort Leung, Angus
collection PubMed
description The physical basis of consciousness remains one of the most elusive concepts in current science. One influential conjecture is that consciousness is to do with some form of causality, measurable through information. The integrated information theory of consciousness (IIT) proposes that conscious experience, filled with rich and specific content, corresponds directly to a hierarchically organised, irreducible pattern of causal interactions; i.e. an integrated informational structure among elements of a system. Here, we tested this conjecture in a simple biological system (fruit flies), estimating the information structure of the system during wakefulness and general anesthesia. Consistent with this conjecture, we found that integrated interactions among populations of neurons during wakefulness collapsed to isolated clusters of interactions during anesthesia. We used classification analysis to quantify the accuracy of discrimination between wakeful and anesthetised states, and found that informational structures inferred conscious states with greater accuracy than a scalar summary of the structure, a measure which is generally championed as the main measure of IIT. In stark contrast to a view which assumes feedforward architecture for insect brains, especially fly visual systems, we found rich information structures, which cannot arise from purely feedforward systems, occurred across the fly brain. Further, these information structures collapsed uniformly across the brain during anesthesia. Our results speak to the potential utility of the novel concept of an “informational structure” as a measure for level of consciousness, above and beyond simple scalar values.
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-7946294
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2021
publisher Public Library of Science
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-79462942021-03-19 Integrated information structure collapses with anesthetic loss of conscious arousal in Drosophila melanogaster Leung, Angus Cohen, Dror van Swinderen, Bruno Tsuchiya, Naotsugu PLoS Comput Biol Research Article The physical basis of consciousness remains one of the most elusive concepts in current science. One influential conjecture is that consciousness is to do with some form of causality, measurable through information. The integrated information theory of consciousness (IIT) proposes that conscious experience, filled with rich and specific content, corresponds directly to a hierarchically organised, irreducible pattern of causal interactions; i.e. an integrated informational structure among elements of a system. Here, we tested this conjecture in a simple biological system (fruit flies), estimating the information structure of the system during wakefulness and general anesthesia. Consistent with this conjecture, we found that integrated interactions among populations of neurons during wakefulness collapsed to isolated clusters of interactions during anesthesia. We used classification analysis to quantify the accuracy of discrimination between wakeful and anesthetised states, and found that informational structures inferred conscious states with greater accuracy than a scalar summary of the structure, a measure which is generally championed as the main measure of IIT. In stark contrast to a view which assumes feedforward architecture for insect brains, especially fly visual systems, we found rich information structures, which cannot arise from purely feedforward systems, occurred across the fly brain. Further, these information structures collapsed uniformly across the brain during anesthesia. Our results speak to the potential utility of the novel concept of an “informational structure” as a measure for level of consciousness, above and beyond simple scalar values. Public Library of Science 2021-02-26 /pmc/articles/PMC7946294/ /pubmed/33635858 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1008722 Text en © 2021 Leung et al http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Leung, Angus
Cohen, Dror
van Swinderen, Bruno
Tsuchiya, Naotsugu
Integrated information structure collapses with anesthetic loss of conscious arousal in Drosophila melanogaster
title Integrated information structure collapses with anesthetic loss of conscious arousal in Drosophila melanogaster
title_full Integrated information structure collapses with anesthetic loss of conscious arousal in Drosophila melanogaster
title_fullStr Integrated information structure collapses with anesthetic loss of conscious arousal in Drosophila melanogaster
title_full_unstemmed Integrated information structure collapses with anesthetic loss of conscious arousal in Drosophila melanogaster
title_short Integrated information structure collapses with anesthetic loss of conscious arousal in Drosophila melanogaster
title_sort integrated information structure collapses with anesthetic loss of conscious arousal in drosophila melanogaster
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7946294/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33635858
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1008722
work_keys_str_mv AT leungangus integratedinformationstructurecollapseswithanestheticlossofconsciousarousalindrosophilamelanogaster
AT cohendror integratedinformationstructurecollapseswithanestheticlossofconsciousarousalindrosophilamelanogaster
AT vanswinderenbruno integratedinformationstructurecollapseswithanestheticlossofconsciousarousalindrosophilamelanogaster
AT tsuchiyanaotsugu integratedinformationstructurecollapseswithanestheticlossofconsciousarousalindrosophilamelanogaster