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Sleep on it: How the brain processes many experiences, even when 'offline'
In a new study, Yale researchers uncover how the brain, during sleep, replays and bundles many of the experiences that occur in our waking hours.
“The brain mechanisms we uncovered are relevant for how we form and express internally generated representations about the world, like memories, imagining, and insight,” said George Dragoi, an associate professor of psychiatry and of neuroscience at Yale School of Medicine and corresponding author of the study. An increasing amount of neuroscience research is exploring how neuronal ensembles represent experiences in the brain, a complex process that has implications for learning and memory, cognitive mapping, and spatial navigation. For the new study, the researchers recorded the activity of hippocampal neurons in rats that were allowed to move freely through 15 different spatial contexts over 19 ½ hours, a time span that included periods of extended sleep, during a single day.
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