Neural underpinning of a respiration-related resting-state fMRI network

Respiration can induce non-neural artifacts in the resting-state fMRI (rsfMRI) signal. In the meantime, as a crucial physiologic process, respiration that can directly drive neural activity change, and may thereby modulate the rsfMRI signal. Nonetheless, this potential neural component in the respiration-fMRI relationship remains elusive. To elucidate this issue, we developed a platform to achieve a concurrent measure of electrophysiology, respiration, and whole brain rsfMRI signals, and identified a respiration-associated network that was underpinned by neural activity, which represents a novel component in the respiration-rsfMRI relationship that is distinct from respiration-related rsfMRI artifacts.