Bismillahirrohmaanirrohiim
Published April 27, 2011
If you think you can function on minimal sleep, here's a wake-up call: Parts of your brain may doze off even if you're totally awake, according to a new study in rats.
Scientists observed the electrical activity of brains in rats forced to stay up longer than usual. Problem-solving brain regions fell into a kind of "local sleep"—a condition likely in sleep-deprived humans too, the study authors say.
Surprisingly, when sections of the rats' brains entered these sleeplike states, "you couldn't tell that [the rats] are in any way in a different state of wakefulness," said study co-author Giulio Tononi, a neuroscientist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison.
Despite these periods of local sleep, overall brain activity—and the rats’ behaviors—suggested the animals were fully awake.
