About the Authors

Imanuel Lerman

Roles Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition, Investigation, Methodology, Project administration, Resources, Software, Supervision, Validation, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

ilerman@ucsd.edu

Current address: VA San Diego, La Jolla Village Dr, San Diego, CA (MC116A), United States of America

Affiliations VA Center of Excellence for Stress and Mental Health, VA San Diego Healthcare System, La Jolla, CA, United States of America, Department of Anesthesiology, Center for Pain Medicine, University of California San Diego School of Medicine, La Jolla, CA, United States of America, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA, United States of America

Bryan Davis

Roles Data curation, Formal analysis, Investigation, Methodology, Project administration

Affiliation Department of Anesthesiology, Center for Pain Medicine, University of California San Diego School of Medicine, La Jolla, CA, United States of America

Mingxiong Huang

Roles Data curation, Writing – review & editing

Affiliations Department of Radiology, University of California San Diego School of Medicine, La Jolla, CA, United States of America, Department of Radiology, VA San Diego Healthcare System, La Jolla, CA, United States of America

Charles Huang

Roles Methodology, Writing – review & editing

Affiliations Department of Radiology, University of California San Diego School of Medicine, La Jolla, CA, United States of America, Department of Radiology, VA San Diego Healthcare System, La Jolla, CA, United States of America

Linda Sorkin

Roles Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Department of Anesthesiology, Center for Pain Medicine, University of California San Diego School of Medicine, La Jolla, CA, United States of America

James Proudfoot

Roles Data curation, Formal analysis, Software, Validation, Visualization, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Department of Anesthesiology, Center for Pain Medicine, University of California San Diego School of Medicine, La Jolla, CA, United States of America

Edward Zhong

Roles Data curation, Software

Affiliation Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA, United States of America

Donald Kimball

Roles Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA, United States of America

Ramesh Rao

Roles Conceptualization, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA, United States of America

Bruce Simon

Roles Writing – review & editing

Affiliation electroCore LLC, Basking Ridge NJ, United States of America

Andrea Spadoni

Roles Writing – review & editing

Affiliations VA Center of Excellence for Stress and Mental Health, VA San Diego Healthcare System, La Jolla, CA, United States of America, Department of Psychiatry University of California San Diego School of Medicine, La Jolla, CA, United States of America

Irina Strigo

Roles Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Department of Psychiatry, VA San Francisco Healthcare System, San Francisco, CA, United States of America

Dewleen G. Baker

Roles Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition, Supervision, Writing – review & editing

Affiliations VA Center of Excellence for Stress and Mental Health, VA San Diego Healthcare System, La Jolla, CA, United States of America, Department of Psychiatry University of California San Diego School of Medicine, La Jolla, CA, United States of America

Alan N. Simmons

Roles Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition, Investigation, Project administration, Software, Supervision, Validation, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Affiliations VA Center of Excellence for Stress and Mental Health, VA San Diego Healthcare System, La Jolla, CA, United States of America, Department of Psychiatry University of California San Diego School of Medicine, La Jolla, CA, United States of America

Competing Interests

Bruce Simon PhD has stock/shares in Electrocore LLC. Imanuel Lerman MD MSc carried out prior investigator initiated research that was funded by Electrocore LLC including investigating anti-inflammatory effects of nVNS and neural effects of nVNS measured with MEG. These prior studies do not overlap with this study and Electrocore had no part in this study funding or design. This does not alter our adherence to PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials.