Fig. 4: Hierarchy of target neurotransmitter receptors based on how their simulated activation displaces whole-brain dynamics towards conscious wakefulness.

Panels (A) and (B) display embedded trajectories for perturbing the MCS and UWS baseline models, respectively, at the different receptors. All perturbations displace the embedded FC matrices along the same axis in latent space, indicating significant variations in the final distance covered across the entire perturbation range. This is presented in panels (C) and (D), where the covered distances are similar, with differences in the maximum distance reached. Specifically, for UWS, the perturbations did not deviate as far from their starting point, as was observed for the MCS models. Simulated perturbations at the serotonergic receptors and the MU receptor presented the most significant impact on the models.