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Fast track: Unilateral vibrissae stimulation during waking induces interhemispheric EEG asymmetry during subsequent sleep in the rat
Author(s) -
Vyazovskiy V.,
Borbély A. A.,
Tobler I.
Publication year - 2000
Publication title -
journal of sleep research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.297
H-Index - 117
eISSN - 1365-2869
pISSN - 0962-1105
DOI - 10.1046/j.1365-2869.2000.00230.x
Subject(s) - somatosensory system , cortex (anatomy) , neuroscience , sleep spindle , non rapid eye movement sleep , sleep (system call) , psychology , stimulation , electroencephalography , rapid eye movement sleep , sensory system , neuroscience of sleep , audiology , medicine , computer science , operating system
To test the theory that sleep is a regional, use‐dependent process, rats were subjected to unilateral sensory stimulation during waking. This was achieved by cutting the whiskers on one side, in order to reduce the sensory input to the contralateral cortex. The animals were kept awake for 6 h in an enriched environment to activate the cortex contralateral to the intact side. Whiskers are known to be represented in the barrel field of the contralateral somatosensory cortex and their stimulation during exploratory behavior results in a specific activation of the projection area. In the 6 h recovery period following sleep deprivation, spectral power of the nonrapid eye‐movement (NREM) sleep EEG in the 0.75–6.0 Hz range exhibited an interhemispheric shift towards the cortex that was contralateral to the intact whiskers. The results support the theory that sleep has a regional, use‐dependent facet.