This report describes the relationship between monoamines, sleep and seizures before and 1-month after amygdala kindling in young cats (<1 year old; n=8; six female and two male). Concentrations (fmoles of norepinephrine or NE, dopamine or DA and serotonin or 5-HT) were quantified in consecutive, 5-min microdialysis samples (2 microl/min infusion rate) from amygdala and locus ceruleus complex (LC) during four, 6-8-h polygraphic recordings before (n=2) and 1 month post-kindling (n=2); 5-min recording epochs were temporally adjusted to correspond to dialysate samples and differentiated according to dominant sleep or waking state (lasting > or =80% of 5-min epoch) and degree of spontaneous seizure activity (number and duration of focal versus generalized spikes and spike trains and behavioral seizure correlates). Post-kindling records in each cat were divided into two groups (n=1 record each) based on higher or lower spontaneous EEG and behavioral seizure activity and compared to pre-kindling records. We found: (1) before and after kindling, NE and 5-HT but not DA concentrations were significantly lower in sleep than waking at both sites; (2) after kindling, each cat showed cyclic patterns, as follows: (a) higher NE, 5-HT and DA concentrations accompanied increased seizure activity with delayed sleep onset latency and increased sleep fragmentation (reduced sleep state percentages, number of epochs and/or epoch duration) in one recording versus (b) lower monoaminergic concentrations accompanied reduced seizure activity, rapid sleep onset and reduced sleep disruption in the other recording. The alternating, post-kindling pattern suggested "rebound" effects which could explain some controversies in the literature about chronic effects of kindling on monoamines and sleep-waking state patterns.