The sleeping rat cycles between two well characterized physiological states, slow-wave sleep (SWS) and rapid eye-movement sleep (REM), often identified by the presence of large irregular activity (LIA) and theta activity, respectively, in the hippocampal EEG. Inspection of the activity of ensembles of hippocampal CA1 complex-spike cells along with the EEG reveals the presence of a third physiological state, distinctly different from both REM and SWS in both hippocampal EEG and population activity. The EEG during this state abruptly flattens for a few seconds, appearing very similar to the small-amplitude irregular activity (SIA) hippocampal EEG state reported in the literature to occur when rats are startled out of sleep. The flattening of the EEG is accompanied by a striking pattern of spike activity in the population of hippocampal pyramidal cells, wherein a small subset of cells becomes very active while the rest become quiet; the same subset of cells is usually active across long sequences of SIA. This dissertation shows (1) that these active cells are place cells whose place fields are in the location in which the rat is sleeping; (2) that the spontaneous SIA observed during sleep corresponds to the SIA state of increased alertness that has been reported in the literature to occur when rats are startled out of sleep; (3) that SIA is accompanied by a desynchronized neocortical EEG and low amplitude EMG; (4) that the cells active in SIA reflect a memory for the location in which the rat fell asleep, rather than an assessment of its location based on current sensory information; and (5) that the generation of SIA is likely to involve an increase of serotonin levels in the medial septal nucleus. It is proposed that SIA serves as a neural substrate for maintaining context memory during sleep, and that it reflects a partial arousal in response to internal or external stimuli that allows the animal to assess whether full awakening is warranted, without disrupting the sleep cycle.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:PITT/oai:PITTETD:etd-12152003-161042 |
| Date | 16 January 2004 |
| Creators | Jarosiewicz, Beata |
| Contributors | Bruce McNaughton, David Touretzky, James Ranck, Carl Olson, Anthony Grace, James McClelland, William E. Skaggs |
| Publisher | University of Pittsburgh |
| Source Sets | University of Pittsburgh |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.library.pitt.edu/ETD/available/etd-12152003-161042/ |
| Rights | unrestricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to University of Pittsburgh or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
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