RUI: Physiology of Sleep and Assessment of the Costs of Experimental Sleep Loss in Arctic-Breeding Songbirds

睡眠是一个重要的恢复过程，但在现代社会中往往被忽视。在人类中，慢性睡眠不足（失眠，轮班工作，睡眠呼吸暂停）对正常的生理和心理功能有负面影响，并且是许多慢性疾病的风险因素，如代谢和心血管疾病。在北极，迁徙鸣禽每天活动20小时，以利用持续的夏季光线，似乎不会受到众所周知的睡眠不足的不利影响，如生理和认知功能障碍。本研究旨在调查阿拉斯加州（71°N）巴罗北极繁殖鸣禽的睡眠模式，并评估睡眠损失的成本和收益。该提案的更广泛影响包括培训下一代科学教师，为阿拉斯加农村的K-12学生提供指导，让传统上代表性不足的学生（高中，本科和研究生）和博士后学员参与合作研究，并将研究成果传播给科学家和公众。睡眠对大多数生物体来说是必不可少的，尽管它的确切功能是个谜。众所周知，慢性睡眠不足对人类健康和表现有不利影响。然而，其他物种显示出多种多样的睡眠模式，挑战了睡眠减少对所有脊椎动物来说都是代价高昂的假设。这项提议利用最先进的小型化发射器来评估自由放养的鸣禽的睡眠结构。北极繁殖雀在迁徙过程中表现出延长的觉醒，并且在连续日光盛行的繁殖地每天活跃20小时。该项目旨在调查在北极高纬度地区（阿拉斯加州巴罗，北纬71度）繁殖的两种具有不同生活史策略的鸣禽的睡眠/觉醒周期。 据推测，自然选择和性选择都在决定他们的睡眠模式方面发挥了作用。接下来，每天的睡眠将通过实验增加或减少，以评估生活史与繁殖力和/或生存率的权衡。 最后，该假设将测试北极繁殖的鸣禽是否更有弹性的代谢，认知，激素和免疫成本的睡眠损失相比，温带繁殖的鸟类圈养。更广泛的影响包括一个未来的科学教师计划，促进科学教师的培训，为阿拉斯加农村的K-12学生开发教学模块，以及一个跨文化研究计划，为阿拉斯加和肯塔基州的高中学生，以协助实地研究。这项研究的结果将有助于我们了解包括人类在内的北极居住物种如何科普持续的北极光。

Sleep is an essential and restorative process that is often neglected in modern society. In humans, chronic sleep loss (insomnia, shift work, sleep apnea) has negative consequences on normal physiological and mental function and is a risk factor for many chronic conditions, such as metabolic and cardiovascular diseases. In the Arctic, migratory songbirds are active for 20 hours/day to take advantage of constant summer light, and seemingly do not suffer from the well-known detrimental effects of sleep loss, such as physiological and cognitive dysfunction. This research aims to investigate sleep patterns and assess the costs and benefits of sleep loss in arctic-breeding songbirds in Barrow, Alaska (71°N). Broader impacts of the proposal include training the next generation of science teachers to provide instruction to K-12 students of rural Alaska, engaging students (high school, undergraduate, and graduate) and postdoctoral trainees from traditionally underrepresented backgrounds in collaborative research, and disseminating research findings to scientists and the general public.Sleep is essential for most organisms, although its precise function is enigmatic. Chronic sleep loss is well known to have detrimental effects on human health and performance. However, other species display a diversity of sleep patterns that challenge the assumption that reduced sleep is costly for all vertebrates. This proposal takes advantage of state-of-the-art miniaturized transmitters to assess sleep architecture in free-ranging songbirds. Arctic-breeding passerines exhibit extended wakefulness during migration and are active 20 hours/day on their breeding grounds where continuous daylight prevails. The project aims to investigate the sleep/wake cycles of two species of songbirds with different life-history strategies that breed in the high Arctic (Barrow, Alaska, 71° N). It is hypothesized that both natural and sexual selection play a role in determining their sleep patterns. Next, daily sleep will be experimentally increased or decreased to assess life-history tradeoffs with fecundity and/or survivorship. Lastly, the hypothesis will be tested whether arctic-breeding songbirds are more resilient to metabolic, cognitive, hormonal, and immunological costs of sleep loss compared with temperate-breeding birds in captivity. Broader impacts include a Future Teachers of Science program that fosters training of science teachers to develop teaching modules for K-12 students of rural Alaska and a cross-cultural research program for high school students of Alaska and Kentucky to assist with field research. Results from the research will contribute to our understanding of how arctic-dwelling species, including humans, cope with continuous periods of arctic light.