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To reach this conclusion, a team from the University of Michigan and Rice University analyzed the brain wave patterns of rats during wakefulness and sleep.
It turns out that the neurons activated in the brain’s memory center during sleep do more than just analyze past experiences. According to new findings from the researchers, they also attempt to peek into the future by rehearsing actions that have yet to occur.
How the Research Was Conducted
The researchers recorded the brain wave activity of rats while they were awake and asleep. They collected data before, during, and after the rodents solved tasks in a maze to assess the benefits of neural activity outside the maze, such as during rest periods.
“We tackled this problem by linking the activity of each individual neuron to the activity of the other neurons,” said anesthesiologist Kamran Diba, a co-author of the study. He noted that the ability to “track the advantages of neurons even without stimuli was a significant breakthrough.”
The novelty of the approach lay in the team’s ability not only to connect physical spaces in the maze with specific neural activity in real-time but also to work in reverse, correlating neural activity with points in the maze while the rats were sleeping.
This was made possible through a machine learning process that weighs the relationships between neurons rather than viewing them in isolation. Based on how the rats’ neurons activated during sleep and then during their subsequent attempts to navigate the maze, the rodents were not merely dreaming about places they had already visited; they were also working on potential new routes.
The results are significant for understanding the spatial configuration of how the activity of certain neurons is linked to specific locations. This configuration is a dynamic process, and it seems to involve the brain of the sleeping individual, as reported by Science Alert.
When the rats were reintroduced to the maze after waking, the neural activity measured during sleep somewhat predicted new ways of exploring their environment. The matches were not exact, but they were close enough to suggest a connection between dreams and future intentions.
“When we return the animals to the environment a second time, we can confirm that these changes truly reflect what they learned while they were sleeping,” noted neurobiologist Caleb Kemere.
It is well known that sleep helps us form memories. And while this study involved rats, it is quite likely that something similar occurs in the human brain: a kind of rehearsal for future adventures.
“It’s not necessarily the case that during sleep, neurons are only stabilizing memories of experiences. It turns out that some of them are doing something else,” summarized Mr. Kemere.
The study’s findings were published in the journal Nature.
