SINCE THE EARLY WORK of Magoun and Moruzzi’ and others, attention has been focused on the reticular formation in the central nervous system. Recently it has been speculated, and some evidence obtained,? that this diffuse system is involved in maintaining the conscious state of the organism. During the past 15 years, one of the authors has been interested in the variations in consciousness which fall in the borderline epileptic states,3v4 and another of the authors has observed the results of thalamic stimulation in cats6 We felt it would be of interest to determine if variations in consciousness could be produced by stimulation of various areas in the reticular formation. The Macaca mulatta was chosen as the experimental animal with this in mind. It is noteworthy that, in making observations on variations in consciousness, the experimental animal must be completely free from the effects of sedation of any kind.
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