CHANGES IN SLEEP SPINDLE ACTIVITY OF SUBJECTS WITH CHRONIC SOMATOSENSITIVE AND SENSORY DEFICITS - PRELIMINARY-RESULTS

We investigated the effects of the somatosensitive and sensory afferen t inputs on the thalamic generators of sleep spindles (SS) in adult su bjects affected by posterior funiculi lesions (Jive subjects), deafnes s (four subjects) or blindness (four subjects). The density, duration and frequency of SS, as well as the index of spindling, were analyzed during stage 2 NREM. The results show that the subjects with somatosen sitive and sensorial lesions spent much more time on SS activity than the control group (eight subjects), and had a significantly increased density (<.0001), duration (<.0005) and index of spindling (<.0001). O n the other hand, the frequency of spindling was little modified (<.05 ). Moreover, among the three groups of patients, those with somatosens itive deficits showed the greatest SS activity. In conclusion, our res ults suggest that the thalamic generators of SS are markedly modulated by peripheral inputs in man.