Since there are no immediate behavioral consequences of the ‘off-line’ state-related cell assembly sequences, one can only assume that the utility of such self-organized patterns is to strengthen or consolidate the synaptic changes initiated during the waking experience and to link assembly representations, which never or rarely overlapped during behavior. The responding reader-integrator neurons of such novel replay patterns will be different from the readers representing each experience separately. As a result, such off-line linking of experiences may facilitate their associations in future waking states.16
