In the second half of this semester, we had 2 individuals come to present their research on sleep-related topics. Dr. Gabriella Torres Platas discussed the concept of individuals communicating with an experimenter during REM sleep. She focused particularly on the fact that when individuals lucid dream, we observe brain activity in parts of the brain connected to self-awareness and decision-making. Through an experiment where researchers asked participants in a state of lucid dreaming questions and tracked their eye movements as answers, they found that a majority of the time, participants were able to correctly answer the experimenters' questions. This indicates that two-way communication is possible with dreamers in a lucid state.
Dr. Dan Cavanaugh explored circadian rhythms through lateral posterior clock neurons (LPNs) in fruit flies. When discussing the REM portion of the circadian rhythm, Dr. Cavanaugh mentioned that mammals and other warm-blooded animals do not thermoregulate while in REM, and instead enter a Poikilothermic State. This was extremely interesting to me as these findings seem almost contrary, as REM induces heightened brain activity in one area of processing and a reduced ability to do so in another. This caused me to dig deeper into specific areas of brain activity during REM sleep and why this may happen.
In “A brain-warming function for REM sleep,” author Thomas A. Wehr showed that during non-REM sleep (NREM), the brain significantly cools due to reduced metabolic activity. In periods of REM, we see the brain in a more active state and a sharp increase in this metabolic activity, which causes warming in the brain. Because the brain is warmed by increased processes, we do not see typical thermal regulation throughout the sleep cycle. Wehr also suggests that this warming is to prepare the brain to enter a wake state and that this may be the primary evolutionary cause as to why mammals experience REM sleep.
The findings from “Real-time dialogue between experimenters and dreamers during
REM sleep” by Konkoly et al. complicates this theory as it displays REM sleep as a highly active cognitive state capable of complex information processing, such as two-way communication. Took away from both of these articles is that the warming of the brain during REM sleep is a secondary consequence of the higher neuronal processing that occurs in this state. Because of this, the brain has no need to thermoregulate during the sleep cycle, which is why we see a reduction in certain brain processes. while heightened activities and others.
Konkoly, K. R., Appel, K., Chabani, E., Mangiaruga, A., Gott, J., Mallett, R., ... & Paller, K. A. (2021). Real-time dialogue between experimenters and dreamers during REM sleep. Current Biology, 31(7), 1417-1427.
Wehr, T. A. (1992). A brain-warming function for REM sleep. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews,
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