Michel Jouvet was born in Lons-le-Saunier, France on November 16, 1925. During World War II, he fought with the French Resistance. He studied anthropology and ethnography before entering medical school at the University of Lyon. He became a neurosurgical resident there in 1951. He received a doctorate in 1956. He became a research director at the French Institute of Health and Medical Research in 1966 and a professor and the director of the department of experimental medicine at Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1 in 1968.
He was a neurophysiologist who discovered the region of the brain that controls rapid eye movement (REM) and who helped define REM sleep as a unique state of consciousness common to humans and animals alike. He wrote several books including The Paradox of Sleep: The Story of Dreaming and the novel The Castle of Dreams. He died on October 3, 2017 at the age of 91.
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