Architecture of Experience — Centre for Consciousness Studies, NIMHANS

Three pillars, three foundations

Centre for Consciousness StudiesArchitecture of Experience

Multidimensional awareness

Consciousness across rest, task, meditation and sleep.

Application-oriented research

Schools, clinics, meditation centres and wearables.

Embodied self

The brain–body–environment loop, with interoception as the root of selfhood.

Experiential Indian Knowledge SystemsPractical mastery via traditional methods

Lived experience & contributor expertisePractitioners and patients as co-investigators

Inter-disciplinary neurophysiologyEEG, sleep, heart, breath, imaging, wearables

Legacy → today

Four decades, one question

1976

Project Consciousness

Inaugurated at NIMHANS (Dept. of Neurophysiology, ICMR-funded under Prof. T. Desiraju). A whole-body study of yoga and meditation in sound-proof cabins: 91 men registered; TM, Rajayoga, Yoga Nidra, pranayama.

1982–85

Symposium and first lab

A 1982 symposium on Yoga, Brain & Consciousness brought yoga, neuroscience and philosophy together; the first lab followed with a 13-channel EEG polygraph, a 4-channel portable polygraph and Russian collaborators.

2000–2020

Cognitive & Sleep Lab

Under Prof. Bindu M. Kutty. Expanded beyond sleep into high-density EEG/ERP, fMRI, cognitive paradigm development, and meditation studies across traditions, alongside whole-night polysomnography, Ayurveda/yoga trials, schizophrenia, and lucid dream decoding.

2020+

Centre for Consciousness Studies

Founded by Prof. Bindu M. Kutty. Four core areas: sleep & dreams, mind–body & contemplative, clinical & developmental, neurotechnology. Cross-tradition EEG, wearables, open-source tools.

Yoga is not a relaxation switch. It trains homeostatic adaptability. Lesson of Project Consciousness: after TM, ventilation fell; after Rajayoga and pranayama it rose. Every person showed their own pattern, session to session.

Why a middle ground

Two ways of knowing, one human being

Eastern · contemplative

First-person wisdom

Subjective introspection
Qualitative assessment
Holistic: connectedness

Middle ground

A consciousness lens, with health as a continuum

Measurement from neuroscience, maps of a healthy, flexible mind from tradition, tested in real-world settings with advanced neurotechnology.

Neurophenomenological designsMultivariate analysisReal-world technology

Western · neuroscientific

Third-person measurement

Objective evaluation
Quantifiable data
Reductionist, materialistic

Health as a continuum, not a binary

IllnessNormalWellbeing

A person’s position shifts with the state they are in. We use four states as lenses:RestTaskMeditationSleep

Complementary perspectives, one architecture

Ravindra NagendraThe body

Yoga trains adaptability; sleep is the overnight readout of the heart–brain–breath loop.

Arun SasidharanThe clinic

Health is a continuum, measured with one ruler at both ends.

Praerna ChowdhuryThe traditions

Respect a tradition’s architecture and real differences appear.

Rahul VenugopalBeyond the brain

The self is read across brain, body, behaviour, experience and environment.

Selected results; see Publications for full citations. Some are preprints, theses or preliminary.

Beyond the lab, and what’s next

01SenseWearable EEG, heart, breath

02DecodeBrain-state machine learning

03PersonaliseNeurofeedback, N-of-1

04ModulatetACS, sound, scent, tVNS

Programme

UNISONInner silence across traditions · expert meditators

An experience-state space: sleep, dreaming, rest, cognition, meditation, flow and dysregulated states as dynamic configurations
EEG, HRV, respiration, MRI, experience sampling and real-world monitoring
Pañcakośa operationalised; machine learning for which practice suits whom, and when