LAUSR

Using Human Connectome Project (HCP) data, Gohel et al. (2016) (GEA) recently reported that “resting-state MEG signals failed to exhibit ubiquitous phase-amplitude coupling (PAC) phenomenon, contrary to what has been suggested” by Florin and Baillet (2015) (FB). GEA argued that the original PAC findings by FB were driven by false positives resulting from the use of inappropriate methods. In this commentary, we first correct GEA’s mischaracterization of the approach actually used by FB. We then investigated the PAC computations in Gohel et al. (2016) (GEA) and demonstrate that with FB’s approach, it is actually possible to detect PAC in the Human Connectome Project (HCP) resting-state data. Finally, when making the data processing as similar as possible to GEA we still found significant PAC across large portions of the brain.