TOPICS

Language

A past research topic consisted in exploring the neural correlates of the processing of figurative language, combining and interference approach by means of TMS (e.g. Oliveri, Romero & Papagno, 2004) with fMRI (Romero Lauro et al., 2013) during ad hoc tasks, and behavioral studies on healthy participants and clinical population (e.g. Schettino et al., 2009).

Verbal Short-term Memory

The neural correlates of verbal short-term memory have been examined on neuropsychological patients, by means of TMS (Romero at al., 2006; 2011), TMS and EMG recording (Romero Lauro et al., 2020).

Emotions

The expression and comprehension of emotions are crucial aspects of human social interactions. The group studies the neural correlates of emotion processing, with a particular attention to facial expressions, by means of behavioural and neuroimaging experiments in healthy and clinical populations. A third focus has been exploring the network underlying emotion processing and negative emotion regulation (e.g. Vergallito et al., 2019).

Clinical application of NIBS

A series of studies explored the chance of modulating social pain by applying tDCS on a key brain area of the emotion regulation, namely the ventrolateral prefrontal cortex (VLPFC; e.g. Riva et al., 2011). 

In another series of studies, tDCS was used to boost the ability to comprehend sentence with high syntactic complexity (e.g. Giustolisi et al., 2018).

A past research topic investigates the promising possibility of applying non-invasive brain stimulation to treat eating disorders, in collaboration with specialized Psychiatric Units (e.g. Mattavelli et al., 2019).

A current focus is the use of TMS and tDCS as add-on treatment for patients with Mood Disorders and Substance Use Disorders (e.g. Vergallito et al., 2021)

Another current research trend focus on the use of TMS-EEG to complement clinical evaluation in the diagnosis and prognosis of patients with Consciousness Disorders.

The feasibility and reliability of using TMS-EEG to evaluate anomalous pattern of cortical excitability in patients with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis is under investigation.

Neurophysiology: the effect of tDCS and tACS on cortical excitability and connectivity by means of TMS-EEG.

In a series of studies the effects of both anodal and cathodal tDCS on cortical excitability and connectivity have been systematically explored during rest and task execution conditions (e.g. Romero Lauro et al., 2014; Pisoni et al., 2018; Varoli et al., 2019) by means of TMS-EEG.

A current trend of research focus on the entrainment effects induced by tACS.

Neuroeconomy

In collaboration with the Department of Economics, University of Milano-Bicocca, the use of neuroscientific methods applied to research questions belonging to the Behavioural Economy has been explored (e.g. Pisoni et al., 2013; Lo Gerfo et al., 2020).