Subcortical Mechanisms of Unihemispheric Sleep in the Fur Seal

海狗单半球睡眠的皮层下机制

• 批准号: 0919929
• 负责人: Oleg Lyamin
• 金额: $ 91万
• 依托单位: Sepulveda Research Corporation
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2009
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2009-09-01 至 2015-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0919929&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Subcortical; Mechanisms; Unihemispheric; Sleep; Fur

Dolphins display an unusual form of sleep called unihemispheric slow wave sleep (USWS), in which brain waves typical of sleep appear in only one half of the cortex at a time. They do not exhibit rapid eye movement (REM) sleep at any time. This laboratory and their collaborators have found that when fur seals are on land they have both bilateral sleep, and REM sleep resembling the sleep seen in humans and all other land mammals. However, when fur seals are in water, their home for 6 months of the year, they have USWS and little or no REM sleep, like dolphins. Therefore, the sleep behavior of fur seals provides a unique opportunity to determine how the brain waves of sleep are generated and why, although all other mammals have REM sleep, this state is absent or greatly reduced when USWS occurs. To answer these questions, the project will focus on the changes going on below the cortex, determining the nature of the neurotransmitters that are released in subcortical regions during the various waking and sleep states. It is expected that this will lead to fundamental new understandings of "why we sleep" and "why we dream," two of the most important unanswered questions in neuroscience. Three graduate students will be trained and will complete their Ph.D.s during this project. This project represents a model international collaboration between a Russian marine mammal facility that is currently the only place in the world with the facilities and expertise to study sleep in marine mammals and laboratories in the USA, Japan, South Africa and Switzerland. This award is co-funded by NSF's Office of International Science and Engineering.

海豚表现出一种不寻常的睡眠形式，称为单半球慢波睡眠（USWS），其中典型的睡眠脑电波一次仅出现在一半的皮质中。他们任何时候都不会表现出快速眼动 (REM) 睡眠。该实验室及其合作者发现，当海狗在陆地上时，它们会进行双边睡眠和快速眼动睡眠，类似于人类和所有其他陆地哺乳动物的睡眠。 然而，当海狗一年中有 6 个月在水中生活时，它们会像海豚一样进行 USWS，并且很少或根本没有 REM 睡眠。因此，海狗的睡眠行为提供了一个独特的机会来确定睡眠的脑电波是如何产生的，以及为什么尽管所有其他哺乳动物都有快速眼动睡眠，但当USWS发生时这种状态却不存在或大大减少。 为了回答这些问题，该项目将重点关注皮质下发生的变化，确定在各种清醒和睡眠状态下皮质下区域释放的神经递质的性质。 预计这将带来对“我们为什么睡觉”和“为什么我们做梦”这两个神经科学中最重要的未解答问题的根本性新理解。 三名研究生将在该项目期间接受培训并完成博士学位。 该项目代表了俄罗斯海洋哺乳动物机构之间的国际合作典范，该机构是目前世界上唯一拥有研究海洋哺乳动物睡眠的设施和专业知识的机构，以及美国、日本、南非和瑞士的实验室。该奖项由美国国家科学基金会国际科学与工程办公室共同资助。