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Microsleep is associated with brain activity patterns unperturbed by auditory inputs.

Microsleep is associated with brain activity patterns unperturbed by auditory inputs.

Authors :
Yong Z
Tan JH
Hsieh PJ
Source :
Journal of neurophysiology [J Neurophysiol] 2019 Dec 01; Vol. 122 (6), pp. 2568-2575. Date of Electronic Publication: 2019 Sep 25.
Publication Year :
2019

Abstract

Microsleeps are brief episodes of arousal level decrease manifested through behavioral signs. Brain activity during microsleep in the presence of external stimulus remains poorly understood. In this study, we sought to understand neural responses to auditory stimulation during microsleep. We gave participants the simple task of listening to audios of different pitches and amplitude modulation frequencies during early afternoon functional MRI scans. We found the following: 1 ) microsleep was associated with cortical activations in broad motor and sensory regions and deactivations in thalamus, irrespective of auditory stimulation; 2 ) high and low pitch audios elicited different activity patterns in the auditory cortex during awake but not microsleep state; and 3 ) during microsleep, spatial activity patterns in broad brain regions were similar regardless of the presence or types of auditory stimulus (i.e., stimulus invariant). These findings show that the brain is highly active during microsleep but the activity patterns across broad regions are unperturbed by auditory inputs. NEW & NOTEWORTHY During deep drowsy states, auditory inputs could induce activations in the auditory cortex, but the activation patterns lose differentiation to high/low pitch stimuli. Instead of random activations, activity patterns across the brain during microsleep appear to be structured and may reflect underlying neurophysiological processes that remain unclear.

Details

Language :
English
ISSN :
1522-1598
Volume :
122
Issue :
6
Database :
MEDLINE
Journal :
Journal of neurophysiology
Publication Type :
Academic Journal
Accession number :
31553690
Full Text :
https://doi.org/10.1152/jn.00825.2018