Development of tools and standards for dissecting the temporal properties of EEG events during sleep

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Sleep is essential for the function of the brain. Learning and memory, cognitive performance, emotional stability, reaction time and judgement are all compromised by poor sleep and sleep deprivation. During sleep the brain performs unique and repetitive patterns of activity that can be measured using electroencephalography (EEG). Many of these distinct patterns, such as 'sleep-spindles' can be described as an EEG fingerprint that is unique to each individual. The study of sleep spindles has gained tremendous interest in recent years. They play an important role in learning and memory, and are altered by aging, psychiatric and neurological disorders. However, limitations in the current tools to study sleep spindles are inhibiting progress in this field. The goal of our research program is to develop tools and standards for the study of sleep spindles, and to provide these open-source resources to the research community. Expanding on our previous work, we have now developed a crowdsourcing platform to gather a large database of spindles from human expert spindle scorers. We use this database to develop and test computer algorithms that analyze the EEG signal and detect sleep spindles. We also propose to develop new analytic tools that measure not just the number of spindles, but characterize important spindle characteristics such as pattern of spindles over time, and the relationship of spindles to other wave patterns seen in the EEG fingerprint. Emerging data suggests that the relationship between spindles and slow waves may play an important role in the consolidation of learning and memory during sleep. Using existing datasets such as the Montreal Archive of Sleep Studies (MASS), we will test whether spindle characteristics and timing influence cognitive performance, learning and memory. Understanding these important events in the EEG fingerprint will help us understand the mysterious process of sleep, and the specific mechanisms that support the function of the brain.