Paradoxical Anesthesia: Sleep-like EEG During Anesthesia Induced by Mesopontine Microinjection of GA
The concept that GABAergic general anesthetic agents induce loss-of-consciousness
by substituting for an endogenous neurotransmitter thereby co-opting neural circuitry
responsible for sleep-wake transitions has gained considerable traction. However, the
electroencephalographic (EEG) signatures of sleep and anesthesia differ
fundamentally. Here we show that when the anesthetic state is generated by focal
delivery of GABAergics to the mesopontine tegmental anesthesia area (MPTA) the
resulting EEG features repeated transitions between delta-wave-dominant and wake-
like patterns much as in REM-NREM sleep. This suggests that systemic (clinical)
anesthetic delivery, which indiscriminately floods the entire cerebrum with powerful
inhibitory agents, obscures the sleep-like EEG signature associated with the less
adulterated form of anesthesia obtained when the drugs are applied selectively to loci
where the effective neurotransmitter substitution actually occurs.
Paradoxical anesthesia cortical EEG
REM-lie behavior during a paradoxical period
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