Jove
Visualize
Contact Us
JoVE
x logofacebook logolinkedin logoyoutube logo
ABOUT JoVE
OverviewLeadershipBlogJoVE Help Center
AUTHORS
Publishing ProcessEditorial BoardScope & PoliciesPeer ReviewFAQSubmit
LIBRARIANS
TestimonialsSubscriptionsAccessResourcesLibrary Advisory BoardFAQ
RESEARCH
JoVE JournalMethods CollectionsJoVE Encyclopedia of ExperimentsArchive
EDUCATION
JoVE CoreJoVE BusinessJoVE Science EducationJoVE Lab ManualFaculty Resource CenterFaculty Site
Terms & Conditions of Use
Privacy Policy
Policies

Related Experiment Videos

Neurological pupillary noise in narcolepsy

W D O'Neill1, A M Oroujeh, A P Keegan

  • 1Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, University of Illinois at Chicago 60607-7053, USA.

Journal of Sleep Research
|December 1, 1996
PubMed
Summary

Pupillometry can now reliably distinguish narcoleptics from controls by measuring pupillary noise. Narcoleptics exhibit significantly less pupillary noise, suggesting a potential diagnostic tool for alertness disorders.

Related Concept Videos

You might also read

Related Articles

Articles linked to this work by shared authors, journal, and citation graph.

Sort by
Same author

The narcoleptic cognitive pupillary response.

IEEE transactions on bio-medical engineering·2001
Same author

Herbal remedies: efficacy in controlling sleepiness and promoting sleep.

Nurse practitioner forum·2001
Same author

Putting sleep disorders to rest.

RN·2000
Same author

Neurologial interpretations and the information in the cognitive pupillary response.

Methods of information in medicine·2000
Same author

Differences in reported sleep need among adolescents.

The Journal of adolescent health : official publication of the Society for Adolescent Medicine·1998
Same author

Pupil noise is a discriminator between narcoleptics and controls.

IEEE transactions on bio-medical engineering·1998

Area of Science:

  • Neuroscience
  • Ophthalmology
  • Sleep Medicine

Background:

  • Pupillometry has a long history of attempting to measure human alertness, but results have been inconclusive.
  • Spontaneous pupillary oscillations and pupillary light reflex (PLR) stimulation have yielded confusing or contradictory indications of alertness.
  • Narcolepsy and sleep deprivation are known to affect alertness, but objective quantitative measures remain elusive.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate pupillometry as a reliable method for measuring alertness in narcolepsy.
  • To derive a quantitative discriminator for classifying narcoleptics and controls using pupillary measurements.
  • To explore the relationship between pupillary noise and the Edinger-Westphal neurons' activity.

Main Methods:

  • Continuous pupil diameter recordings were obtained from 10 narcoleptic and 10 control subjects.

Related Experiment Videos

  • A recursive least squares method was applied to a subject-specific pupillary light reflex (PLR) system model to estimate pupillary noise.
  • The sum of squares of pupillary noise was calculated to quantify differences between groups.

    • Main Results:

    • Narcoleptics demonstrated significantly less pupillary noise (P < 0.005) compared to control subjects.
    • A reliable (90%) discriminator was derived for classifying narcoleptics and controls based on pupillary noise.
    • Reduced pupillary noise in narcoleptics was attributed to supranuclear inhibition of Edinger-Westphal neurons.

    Conclusions:

    • Pupillometry, specifically the measurement of pupillary noise, offers a reliable method for distinguishing narcoleptics from controls.
    • The findings suggest that reduced pupillary noise may be linked to supranuclear inhibition affecting alertness.
    • These results may also be applicable to understanding alertness in the sleep-deprived population, not just narcoleptics.