Sleep changes induced by the local application of 5,7-dihydroxytryptamine into the nodose ganglia and aortic denervation in the rat

✍ Scribed by Hakan S. Orer; Nacera Merahi; Anne Nosjean; Henri Gozlan; Raul Laguzzi

• Publisher: Springer
• Year: 1991
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 459 KB
• Volume: 419
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0031-6768
• DOI: 10.1007/bf00373742

✦ Synopsis

The effects of a bilateral microinjection of 5,7-dihydroxytryptamine (5,7-DHT) into the nodose ganglia and aortic denervation on the daily amounts of sleep/wake states were studied in rats. Both lesions produced an increase in paradoxical sleep and provoked the onset of paradoxical sleep episodes without slow-wave-sleep transition ("narcolepsy-like" paradoxical sleep episodes). The increase in paradoxical sleep observed after 5,7-DHT injection was more important than that of the aortic denervation. In addition, both 5,7-DHT-treated and aortic-denervated animals exhibited a delayed decrease in slow-wave sleep associated with an increase in wakefulness. These results show that the peripheral messages coming from aortic serotonergic afferent fibres to the nucleus tractus solitarius play a modulatory role in the daily expression of paradoxical sleep in rats.