Sleep Spindles as an Electrographic Element: Description and Automatic Detection Methods

Abstract EN

Sleep spindle is a peculiar oscillatory brain pattern which has been associated with a number of sleep (isolation from exteroceptive stimuli, memory consolidation) and individual characteristics (intellectual quotient).

Oddly enough, the definition of a spindle is both incomplete and restrictive.

In consequence, there is no consensus about how to detect spindles.

Visual scoring is cumbersome and user dependent.

To analyze spindle activity in a more robust way, automatic sleep spindle detection methods are essential.

Various algorithms were developed, depending on individual research interest, which hampers direct comparisons and meta-analyses.

In this review, sleep spindle is first defined physically and topographically.

From this general description, we tentatively extract the main characteristics to be detected and analyzed.

A nonexhaustive list of automatic spindle detection methods is provided along with a description of their main processing principles.

Finally, we propose a technique to assess the detection methods in a robust and comparable way.