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Sleep can follow a physiological or behavioral definition. In the physiological sense, sleep is a state characterized by reversible unconsciousness, special brainwave patterns, sporadic eye movement, loss of muscle tone (possibly with some exceptions; see below regarding the sleep of birds and of aquatic mammals), and a compensatory increase following deprivation of the state, this last known ...
Neuroscience of sleep. The neuroscience of sleep is the study of the neuroscientific and physiological basis of the nature of sleep and its functions. Traditionally, sleep has been studied as part of psychology and medicine. [1] The study of sleep from a neuroscience perspective grew to prominence with advances in technology and the ...
Slow-wave sleep (SWS), also known as Stage 3, is characterized by a lack of movement and difficulty of arousal. Slow-wave sleep occurring in both hemispheres is referred to as bihemispheric slow-wave sleep (BSWS) and is common among most animals. Slow-wave sleep contrasts with rapid eye movement sleep (REM), which can only occur simultaneously ...
Diurnality is a form of plant and animal behavior characterized by activity during daytime, with a period of sleeping or other inactivity at night. The common adjective used for daytime activity is " diurnal ". The timing of activity by an animal depends on a variety of environmental factors such as the temperature, the ability to gather food ...
Rapid eye movement sleep (REM sleep or REMS) is a unique phase of sleep in mammals (including humans) and birds, characterized by random rapid movement of the eyes, accompanied by low muscle tone throughout the body, and the propensity of the sleeper to dream vividly. The REM phase is also known as paradoxical sleep (PS) and sometimes ...
The researchers who documented this behaviour called it "sleep-swimming". [31] Sleep could also be absent during specific parts of a fish's life. Species normally quiescent at night become active day and night during the spawning season. [1] Many parental species forego sleep at night and fan their eggs day and night for many days in a row.
The activity/rest cycle (sleep) in animals is one of the circadian rhythms that normally are entrained by environmental cues. In mammals, such endogenous rhythms are generated by the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) of the anterior hypothalamus. Entrainment is accomplished by altering the concentration of clock components through altered gene ...
It was found that certain species of birds have half their brain's hemisphere release brain waves similar to a human's during NREM sleep, and the other half of it fully conscious, allowing them to fly while sleeping. [40] Certain species of dolphins also exhibit similar behavior as birds in order to be able to swim while sleeping. [41]