Narcolepsy is a rare sleep disorder characterized by daytime sleepiness, but with paradoxical difficulty sleeping at night. Some narcoleptic patients also have cataplexy, which is when one suffers from a temporary loss of muscle tone triggered by something exciting.
At Stanford, they have bred dogs that have narcolepsy with cataplexy. Here is a famous video clip of what it looks like:
The cause of narcolepsy is still unclear, but it is believed to be related to orexinergic neurons in the lateral hypothalamus of the brain.
Narcolepsy in orexin knockout mice
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