Question: How does our brain work when we are asleep

Jen Todd Jones answered on 12 Mar 2013:

Hi owalsh1

When we’re asleep our brain actually works a lot like it does when we’re awake! The brain has several stages of sleep that it moves through a few times each night, with level 1 being just after you fall asleep heading down to level 4 and REM (rapid eye movement) stage which is when you are most deeply asleep.

During these stages the brain is slowly getting more and more relaxed, but in the REM stage the brain is actually very active and is usually dreaming. In fact, the brain is so active during this stage that the body is intentionally and temporarily paralysed by the brain so that it doesn’t try and get up and move around while we’re sleeping! In fact, when we’re moving out of this stage of sleep sometimes the body is un-paralysed before the brain is ready and we either feel like we’re falling and jolt awake, or we sleep-walk!

So the brain is typically very active at night, it’s when the brain is repairing any broken-down cells and the muscles in your body get to rest too. Humans cannot survive without sleep, within three days of no sleep we experience hallucination and after a long period of time without sleep we would even die! I don’t know about you but I love sleep, I’m certainly glad we need it 🙂