ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Neurosci.

Sec. Perception Science

Volume 19 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fnins.2025.1555922

Long-lasting effects of lavender exposure on brain resting-state networks in healthy women

Provisionally accepted
ron Kupersron Kupers1,2*Oceane DousteyssierOceane Dousteyssier3Jérôme DelforgeJérôme Delforge3Vanessa GonotVanessa Gonot4Kevin KantonoKevin Kantono5Bernard BlerotBernard Blerot4Laurence DricotLaurence Dricot2Arnaud PêtreArnaud Pêtre3Armin HeineckeArmin Heinecke6
  • 1Institute of Neuroscience & Pharmacology, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
  • 2Université Catholique de Louvain, Louvain-la-Neuve, Walloon Brabant, Belgium
  • 3Brain Impact, Brussels, Belgium
  • 4LMR Naturals, Grass, France
  • 5International Flavors and Fragrances (Netherlands), Hilversum, Netherlands
  • 6NIRx Medizintechnik GmbH, Berlin, Berlin, Germany

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

Select one of your emails

You have multiple emails registered with Frontiers:

Notify me on publication

Please enter your email address:

If you already have an account, please login

You don't have a Frontiers account ? You can register here

Most brain imaging studies on olfaction focus on short-term odorant stimuli, with few examining long-lasting odour exposure or its after-effects. In this study, we utilized resting-state fMRI (rsfMRI) to investigate the effects of prolonged odour exposure to lavender on brain activity and whether these persist post-exposure. Fourteen healthy women underwent two fMRI sessions, conducted one week apart, in a randomized order. Both sessions included rsfMRI scans before, during, and up to two hours after a 14-minute exposure to either lavender essential oil or a non-odorant control. An Independent Component Analysis identified the salience network (SAL) and default mode network (DMN) as the most consistent resting-state networks. A two-factorial ANOVA revealed significant time-varying interaction effects between the SAL and DMN. During odour exposure, functional connectivity (FC) increased within the SAL, and a negative correlation between the SAL and DMN appeared, which intensified immediately after exposure. Two hours post-exposure, the FC between SAL and DMN turned positive. These findings suggest that prolonged odorant exposure to lavender can induce long-lasting brain effects detectable up to two hours afterwards in women. This proof-of-concept study should be extended to other odorants and to men, and offers new possibilities for exploring the effects of aromatherapy or other odour exposure interventions on brain activity.

Keywords: Olfactory connectome, resting state fMRI (rsfMRI), salience network (SAL), default mode network (DMN), independent component analysis (ICA)

Received: 05 Jan 2025; Accepted: 13 May 2025.

Copyright: © 2025 Kupers, Dousteyssier, Delforge, Gonot, Kantono, Blerot, Dricot, Pêtre and Heinecke. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

* Correspondence: ron Kupers, Institute of Neuroscience & Pharmacology, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, 2100, Denmark

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

Supplementary Material