Adaptive brain function requires that sensory impressions of the social and natural milieu are dynamically incorporated into intrinsic brain activity. While dynamic switches between brain states have been well characterised in resting state acquisitions, the remodelling of these state transitions by engagement in naturalistic stimuli remains poorly understood. Here, we show that the temporal dynamics of brain states, as measured in fMRI, are reshaped from predominantly bistable transitions between two relatively indistinct states at rest, toward a sequence of well-defined functional states during movie viewing whose transitions are temporally aligned to specific features of the movie. The expression of these brain states covaries with different physiological states and reflects subjectively rated engagement in the movie. In sum, a data-driven decoding of brain states reveals the distinct reshaping of functional network expression and reliable state transitions that accompany the switch from resting state to perceptual immersion in an ecologically valid sensory experience.

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Simultaneous EEG-fMRI combines two powerful neuroimaging techniques, but the EEG signal suffers from severe artifacts in the MRI environment that are difficult to remove. These are the MR scanning artifact and the blood-pulsation artifact--strategies to remove them are a topic of ongoing research. Additionally large, unsystematic artifacts are produced across the full frequency spectrum by the magnet's helium pump (and ventilator) systems which are notoriously hard to remove. As a consequence, experimenters routinely deactivate the helium pump during simultaneous EEG-fMRI acquisitions which potentially risks damaging the MRI system and necessitates more frequent and expensive helium refills. We present a novel correction method addressing both helium pump and ballisto-cardiac (BCG) artifacts, consisting of carbon-wire loops (CWL) as additional sensors to accurately track unpredictable artifacts related to subtle movements in the scanner, and an EEGLAB plugin to perform artifact correction. We compare signal-to-noise metrics of EEG data, corrected with CWL and three conventional correction methods, for helium pump off and on measurements. Because the CWL setup records signals in real-time, it fits requirements of applications where immediate correction is necessary, such as neuro-feedback applications or stimulation time-locked to specific sleep oscillations. The comparison metrics in this paper relate to: (1) the EEG signal itself, (2) the "eyes open vs. eyes closed" effect, and (3) an assessment of how the artifact corrections impacts the ability to perform meaningful correlations between EEG alpha power and the BOLD signal. Results show that the CWL correction corrects for He pump artifact and also produces EEG data more comparable to EEG obtained outside the magnet than conventional post-processing methods.