Dreams​

1- Scientists know that memories are formed in the brain’s hippocampus, but are transferred probably to the neocortex. Transferring memories from one part of the brain to the other needs changing the connections between neurons.

2- A research team and an associate professor of computation and neural systems used high-tech techniques to listen to the neurons in the brains of rats. These techniques helped them locate several neuron pairs that had precisely the kind of synchronous relationship they were looking for.

3- These relationships between the hippocampal and prefrontal cortex neurons were established, so the team used their high-tech techniques to hear what happens in the brains of sleeping rats.

4- The team heard “bursts”  only during a dreamless phase of sleep. In response, some cells in the prefrontal cortex fired just milliseconds later. “What’s interesting is that the precise timing happens during these bursts and not outside of these bursts”.

5- During rapid-eye-movement (REM) sleep, the previous neuron pairs seemed to talk right after each other, but no longer in harmony. “It was surprising that the timing relationship almost completely disappeared during REM sleep”.

6- REM sleep is the phase when dreaming occurs, so scientists speculate that this absence of memory consolidation can help to explain why dreams can be so difficult to remember.

Source: ScienceDaily

Glossary

Burst: estouro

To fire: acionar