Functional Organization of the Superior Temporal Gyrus for Speech Perception

The basic mechanisms underlying comprehension of spoken language are still largely unknown. Over the past decade, the study team has gained new insights to how the human brain extracts the most fundamental linguistic elements (consonants and vowels) from a complex and highly variable acoustic signal. However, the next set of questions await pertaining to the sequencing of those auditory elements and how they are integrated with other features, such as, the amplitude envelope of speech. Further investigation of the cortical representation of speech sounds can likely shed light on these fundamental questions. Previous research has implicated the superior temporal cortex in the processing of speech sounds, but little is known about how these sounds are linked together into the perceptual experience of words and continuous speech. The overall goal is to determine how the brain extracts linguistic elements from a complex acoustic speech signal towards better understanding and remediating human language disorders.

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Key information

Conditions

Epilepsy Behavior Brain Diseases Brain Neoplasms Brain Tumor Central Nervous System Diseases Central Nervous System Neoplasms Communication Neoplasms Neoplasms by Site Nervous System Diseases Nervous System Neoplasms Speech Verbal Behavior

Age range

18 year–70 year

Sex eligibility

All sexes

Study type

Interventional

Phase

Not applicable

Primary location

University of California, San Francisco

San Francisco, California, 94143, United States

About this study

Intracranial high-density electrodes make it possible to record neural activity directly from the brain surface with unparalleled spatial and temporal resolution to unravel both local and population encoding of speech sounds. This study proposes to assess speech perception in patients who are undergoing surgery for seizure localization or awake intraoperative brain mapping. Electrode placement is based on the clinical needs of each patient. The research study team will examine the mechanisms of phonetic encoding to reveal both the organization of auditory speech feature selectivity and the distributed population-level processing that give rise to the emergent properties of spoken language perception. The aims of this study seeks to determine the cortical encoding of phonological sequencing (Aim 1), representation of amplitude landmark coding in speech (Aim 2), and the shared and distinct mechanisms for speech and music melody encoding (Aim 3). Together, these aims will advance our understanding of speech encoding in the human brain beyond consonants and vowels, addressing questions pertaining to sequencing, amplitude coding, and auditory specialization. These results should heavily impact current theories of speech processing and, therefore, will have significant implications for understanding and remediating human language disorders.

Who can participate

Healthy volunteers accepted: No

Only the study team can determine whether someone qualifies for participation.

Inclusion criteria

Participants with epilepsy or brain tumors at UCSF undergoing surgical electrode implantation for seizure localization or awake intraoperative brain mapping for resection of brain tumors or epilepsy and
Participants with electrodes implanted in at least two regions of interest who are willing and able to cooperate with study tasks.

Exclusion criteria

Participants who lack capacity or decline to provide informed consent,
Participants who have significant cerebral lesions or
Participants with cognitive deficits that preclude reliable completion of study tasks.

Treatment and study plan

Speech Tasks

Behavioral

Listen to 25-minutes of speech sounds in English.

Primary outcomes

Number of Participants with Electrocorticography (ECoG) Signals for Neural Activity Identified During Intraoperative Procedure or Inpatient Hospitalization

Time frame: During Procedure

Number of participants with ECoG signals for neural activity identified during intraoperative procedure or inpatient hospitalization, between 10-30 minutes.

Sponsors and collaborators

Lead sponsor

University of California, San Francisco

Other

Collaborators

National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD)
University of California, Berkeley

Registry information

Important dates

Study start: 2022
Primary completion: 2027
Study completion: 2027
First posted: Jun 28, 2022
Registry last updated: Jun 23, 2026

OpenTrials presents study information sourced from ClinicalTrials.gov. The official registry record should be consulted for the latest information.

View the official ClinicalTrials.gov record (opens in a new tab)

This listing is for discovery and informational purposes only. It is not medical advice, does not guarantee that a study is recruiting, and does not determine eligibility. Contact the study team and a qualified healthcare professional when considering participation.

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