A Study of the Neurophysiological Mechanisms of Dreaming
M. Jouvet and D. Jouvet Electroenceph. Clin. Neurophysiol. 1963 Suppl. 24
TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction

Methods
Part 1

I. Two EEG patterns of physiological sleep in intact cats

II. The neural structures responsible for RPS

III. Structures responsible for somato-vegetative phenomena

IV. Mechanisms of the Rhombencephalic Phase of Sleep

V. Ontogenesis of the RPS
Part 2

A. Normal subjects

B. Patients with brain lesions

Discussion

Summary
Figures

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Summary

Recollection of dreams occurs when a sleeping subject is aroused during the stage of sleep with low voltage EEG activity associated with rapid eye movements. This fact has led to the hypothesis that such a stage of sleep is associated with dreaming.

A similar stage of sleep with fast cortical activity and rapid eye movements has been described in the cat. The neurophysiological mechanisms underlying this stage have been studied in chronic intact, decorticate, mesencephalic and pontile cats. The results show that the periodical fast cortical activity during sleep (Rhombencephalic Phase of Sleep: RPS) is dependent upon triggering of a system located at the level of the nucleus reticularis pontis caudalis in the pontine reticular formation. This system controls the somato-vegetative phenomena which are highly characteristic of the RPS (disappearance of all muscular tonic activity even in the cases of decerebration and decerebellation hypertony, variation in respiratory and cardiac rhythms). The fast cortical and the slow 5/sec rhythmic hippocampal activities occurring during RPS are not suppressed by the interruption of the mesencephalic reticular formation, but are suppressed by lesions of the ventral mesencephalon, the hypothalamus and the septum.

RPS is more profound than the phase of sleep associated with slow cortical activity since the threshold of arousal in the former is higher than in the latter. RPS can be triggered off in animals by stimulating the brain stem and some results suggest that a neuro-humoral mechanism may be responsible for its periodical appearance. In kittens, RPS is the first stage of sleep to appear after birth.

Investigations on normal human subjects confirm that dreaming is associated with the stage of sleep accompanied by rapid eye movements. 3/sec "saw-tooth" waves, occurring at the vertex are specific to this stage. Results obtained on chronic decorticate and decerebrate human subjects have confirmed the main results obtained in the cat, and lead to the conclusion that the stage of sleep with rapid eye movements in humans is similar to the RPS and depends upon the same neural structures.

Such results suggest that dreaming occurs periodically during sleep when a ponto limbic system is brought into play, probably by a neuro-humoral mechanism.

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