Official websites use. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites. Correspondence: shaoyf lzu. The ontogenetic sleep hypothesis suggested that rapid eye movement REM sleep is ontogenetically primitive. Namely, REM sleep plays an imperative role in the maturation of the central nervous system. In coincidence with a rapidly developing brain during the early period of life, a remarkably large amount of REM sleep has been identified in numerous behavioral and polysomnographic studies across species.
The abundant REM sleep appears to serve to optimize a cerebral state suitable for homeostasis and inherent neuronal activities favorable to brain maturation, ranging from neuronal differentiation, migration, and myelination to synaptic formation and elimination. Progressively more studies in Mammalia have provided the underlying mechanisms involved in some REM sleep-related disorders e.
We summarize the remarkable alterations of polysomnographic, behavioral, and physiological characteristics in humans and Mammalia. Through a comprehensive review, we offer a hybrid of animal and human findings, demonstrating that early-life REM sleep disturbances constitute a common feature of many neurodevelopmental disorders. Our review may assist and promote investigations of the underlying mechanisms, functions, and neurodevelopmental diseases involved in REM sleep during early life.
Keywords: rapid eye movement REM sleep, sleep ontogeny, neurodevelopmental disorders, infant, childhood. Rapid eye movements REM during sleep were first reported in adult humans in [ 1 ].
Human REM sleep was subsequently found to be associated with vivid dreaming [ 4 , 5 ], cortical EEG desynchronization, loss of muscle tone [ 4 , 6 ], penile erections, and fluctuation of autonomic systems [ 6 , 7 , 8 ]. Next, an assessment of the proportions of REM sleep in various age periods demonstrated remarkably similar findings in humans [ 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 ] and animals [ 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 ], i.
