Multidimensional Analysis of Twin Sets During an Intensive Week-Long Meditation Retreat: A Pilot Study

Juan P Zuniga-Hertz; Sierra Simpson; Ramamurthy Chitetti; Chang Francis Hsu; Han-Ping Huang; Alex Jinich-Diamant; Andrei V Chernov; Julie A Onton; Raphael Cuomo; Joe Dispenza; Dylan Davis; Leonardo Christov-Moore; Nicco Reggente; Wanjun Gu; Mitchell Kong; Jacqueline A Bonds; Jacqueline Maree; Tatum S Simonson; Andrew C Ahn; Michelle A Poirier; Tobias Moeller-Bertram; Hemal H Patel

doi:10.1007/s12671-025-02584-x

Multidimensional Analysis of Twin Sets During an Intensive Week-Long Meditation Retreat: A Pilot Study

Mindfulness (N Y). 2025;16(6):1634-1655. doi: 10.1007/s12671-025-02584-x. Epub 2025 May 7.

Authors

Juan P Zuniga-Hertz^{1

2}, Sierra Simpson², Ramamurthy Chitetti^{1

2}, Chang Francis Hsu³, Han-Ping Huang³, Alex Jinich-Diamant^{1

2}, Andrei V Chernov^{1

2}, Julie A Onton⁴, Raphael Cuomo², Joe Dispenza⁵, Dylan Davis⁶, Leonardo Christov-Moore⁷, Nicco Reggente⁷, Wanjun Gu⁸, Mitchell Kong⁸, Jacqueline A Bonds^{1

2}, Jacqueline Maree⁹, Tatum S Simonson⁸, Andrew C Ahn³, Michelle A Poirier⁵, Tobias Moeller-Bertram⁹, Hemal H Patel^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Veterans Affairs San Diego Healthcare System, San Diego, CA 92161 USA.
² Department of Anesthesiology, University of California, San Diego, Biomedical Sciences Building, Mail Code 0629, 9500 Gilman Drive, La Jolla, CA 92093 - 0629 USA.
³ Labfront (Kiipo Co.), Boston, MA 02067 USA.
⁴ Institute for Neural Computation, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093 USA.
⁵ Metamorphosis, LLC, Rainier, WA 98576 USA.
⁶ Department of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, CA 94143 USA.
⁷ Institute for Advanced Consciousness Studies, Santa Monica, CA 90403 USA.
⁸ Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine and Physiology, Department of Medicine, School of Medicine, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA USA.
⁹ VitaMed Research, Palm Desert, CA 92260 USA.

Abstract

Objectives: Meditation has long been known to promote health. We utilized a multidisciplinary approach to investigate the impact of mind-body interventions on the body in a twin cohort during a week-long meditation retreat.

Method: This study was designed to address individual changes controlling for intersubject trait variation and explore the role of genetic background on multi-omic factors during meditation. Transcriptomic analysis was carried out from whole blood samples, while metabolomic and biochemical studies were carried out in blood plasma. Quantitative electroencephalography studies, coupled with biometric analysis and molecular studies at multiple time points, were carried out in twins meditating together and in twins separated and simultaneously either meditating or listening to a documentary.

Results: Changes in gene expression, metabolites, and cytokines in blood plasma associated with specific meditative states showed patterns of change relative to the time point being assessed. Twin sets were similar in multiple domains before the start of the retreat, showed considerable divergence at the mid-point, and looked more similar by the end of the retreat. Twin pairs showed significant spectral power correlations in separate rooms and when only one twin meditated. These similarities were not observed in mismatched twin pairs. Heart rate dynamics assessments showed alignment among twin pairs, absent between unmatched pairs.

Conclusions: To our knowledge, this pilot study is novel within the twin research paradigm and is a first step toward exploring the effects of meditation in twins.

Preregistration: This study was not preregistered and was carried out under IRB protocol MED02#20211477.

Supplementary information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s12671-025-02584-x.

Keywords: Brain activity; Gene expression; Meditation; Metabolomics; Mind–body practices; Quantitative electroencephalography (qEEG).