Electromagnetic evidence that benign epileptiform transients of sleep are traveling, rotating hippocampal spikes

Benign epileptiform transients of sleep (BETS) have a unique voltage topography and a posteriorly propagating, inferiorly rotating diphasic EEG pattern. The source generators of BETS have not been definitively identified. We aimed to clarify the cerebral localization of BETS using MEG and electromagnetic source imaging (EMSI).

We analyzed BETS recorded with simultaneous MEG and EEG in four patients with epilepsy. Magnetic source imaging (MSI) and EMSI using equivalent current, single moving and rotating dipole inverse models was performed on averaged BETS potentials. MEG beamforming was performed in one case with abundant BETS.

MSI and EMSI revealed hippocampal dipole source maxima in all cases, with current flow direction rotating from inferomedial to superomedial or superolateral between the first and second BETS peaks. Moving dipole analyses revealed spatiotemporal propagation along the anterior-posterior hippocampal axis and concomitant electromagnetic field rotation. Beamformer source reconstruction revealed an identical hippocampal localization.

Converging evidence from different electromagnetic inverse modeling methods indicates that BETS are traveling, rotating hippocampal spikes, whose diphasic waveform is due to back and forth propagation along the anterior-posterior axis of the hippocampus.

The hippocampal localization and longitudinal, rotating propagation pattern of BETS raises the possibility of a sleep-related functional role for these hippocampal spikes.