Hallucination Research Platform installed at WVU

Nearly half of the patients with Parkinson’s disease (PD) experience hallucinations, and recent studies have shown that hallucinations are associated with negative cognitive outcome and higher mortality. The Blanke Lab has been pioneering a robotic method to induce hallucinations in patients with PD to study the mechanisms behind this symptom. In a collaborative research effort they recently identified a subgroup of patients with increased sensitivity to hallucinations and used magnetic resonance to show that frontotemporal connectivity, associated with hallucinations in healthy participants, was disrupted in patients with PD suffering from hallucinations¹. With the installation of the robotic platform this collaboration network is now extended to include the Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute at the West Virginia University. 

We will study perception and consciousness and combine it with different neural measures. We will also continue the development of novel methods to induce such intriguing mental states.