So I was looking through random articles on a site after being linked to a piece about an angry goat on a roof, and I stumbled onto something very relevant to our interests.

www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/...in-science_n_5562878.html

www.newscientist.com/arti...p-in-brain.html?full=true

In summation (as I've understood it), as part of research into the causes of epilepsy electrical pulses were applied to a part of an epileptic woman's brain, leading to the discovery that stimulation of the claustrum (a part theorized to play a role in integrating the various external inputs and internal information together) caused her stop voluntary action (attempts to continue speaking or moving lead to her slowly growing quieter/moving slower until stopping, but remaining with her eyes open just staring ahead) and have no memory of anything that occurred until the stimulation was removed.

I tried to track down the published study that the articles refer to, but sadly I wasn't able to find any places to access it that didn't require me to somehow get through a paywall.

www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1525505014002017
This one has the summary and might be accessible through your academic institution if you're studying.

www.epilepsybehavior.com/
This is the site of the journal the study is being published in, but I don't think it can actually be accessed through here until volume 37 of the journal is released on the site in August, and it still requires payment. Might be marginally cheaper though?

I can check if my university has access to the journal tomorrow morning if that helps. I'm good at dissecting papers lol

We get a lot of free access to journals like that.

Yeah, I could give it a try on my end, too (grad school, yo)

Though i'd need to email myself the link because there's no way in hell i'm trying to access anything via this site on-campus (mostly because i'm working on campus for now)

*puts on science hat*

So the technique they are using here isn't a new one necessarily. It's called "Deep Brain Stimulation" and is currently being investigated for several applications. It's used in treatment of Parkinson's disease, severe depression, and other neurological disorders.

In layman's terms this is just a technique where they place an electrode deep inside of your brain and gently "zap" it with an electrical signal. This signal does...stuff...it's not actually clear how it works.

In this case, Deep Brain Stimulation was used on a certain part of the subject's brain, and it made her almost like a zombie, one could say. Unconscious, but functioning.

This is what I've gathered from articles and related materials, not the actual journal article unfortunately. My access isn't working remotely so I'll have to go on campus to check. I hope that helps!

Keep in mind, this has only been one patient so far. It's a big find if they can repeat the results.