Multimodal monitoring has become particularly common in the study of human brain function. In this context, combined, synchronous measurements of functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) and electroencephalography (EEG) are getting increased interest. EEG and fNIRS are state-of-the-art techniques for non-invasive and cost-effective functional neuroimaging. Their strengths and limitations depend on the spatiotemporal characteristics of the measured “source” signals in relation to neuronal activity. The integration of EEG and fNIRS can address their shortcomings while leveraging their respective strengths. However, further development of integrated analysis is needed to fully exploit the added value of each modality. Network neuroscience could be an analytical approach for investigating the potential of multimodal approaches in inferring brain function.

In this seminar, I will introduce EEG and fNIRS techniques, explain how to model the electrophysiological and hemodynamic signals in the source space, and present the results of the study exploring the topology of brain networks captured by the two modalities in the resting state (RS) healthy subjects by means of graph theoretical approaches.