Transcranial magnetic stimulation TMS is a non-invasive brain stimulation technique that has been clinically applied for neural modulation.
Conventional TMS systems are restricted by the trade-off between depth penetration and the focality of the induced electric field. In this study, we integrated the concept of temporal interference TI stimulation, which has been demonstrated as a non-invasive deep-brain stimulation method, with magnetic stimulation in a four-coil configuration. The attenuation depth and spread of the electric field were obtained by performing numerical simulation. Consequently, the proposed temporally interfered magnetic stimulation scheme was demonstrated to be capable of stimulating deeper regions of the brain model while maintaining a relatively narrow spread of the electric field, in comparison to conventional TMS systems.
These results demonstrate that TI magnetic stimulation could be a potential candidate to recruit brain regions underneath the cortex. Additionally, by controlling the geometry of the coil array, an analogous relationship between the field depth and focality was observed, in the case of the newly proposed method.
The major limitations of the methods, however, would be the considerable intensity and frequency of the input current, followed by the frustration in the thermal management of the hardware. Transcranial magnetic stimulation TMS is a non-invasive brain stimulation method that has been extensively utilized in investigative research and therapeutic applications.
As a Food and Drug Administration approved technique, TMS is a potentially effective treatment method for a series of psychiatric disorders, including depressive disorders and Parkinson's disease Fitzgerald et al. The theory of TMS is based on the concept that a pulsed magnetic field is delivered to the targeted cortical region via a coil to generate an electric field in the brain as a result of electromagnetic induction. Consequently, the induced electric field can modulate neural activity non-invasively, thus facilitating clinical applications.
