Physiological effects of chronic sleep restriction

睡眠问题和障碍困扰着包括加拿大在内的西方世界一半以上的成年人，给个人和整个社会带来了巨大的成本。睡眠不足与健康和生活质量的各种不良后果有关。尽管如此，迄今为止，研究未能对一些非常基本和重要的问题提供明确的答案，包括“我们需要多少睡眠？“、“我们能适应少睡吗？“，“调节慢性睡眠债后果的生理机制是什么？“这项拟议中的研究旨在回答这些问题。大多数患有睡眠问题的人都经历了持续的碎片化和/或睡眠不足（慢性睡眠限制），而不是完全的睡眠剥夺。已发表的研究表明，长期睡眠限制对人类的神经行为表现和心理健康有显着影响。然而，尽管睡眠问题与身体健康（例如心血管疾病、肥胖症、2型糖尿病和免疫反应抑制）之间存在已知的联系，但对人类或动物慢性睡眠限制的生理后果却很少关注。因此，本研究计划的主要目标是在慢性睡眠限制的大鼠模型中研究自我平衡的生理机制，我实验室的研究已经导致了实现这一目标所需的技术的发展。这些技术旨在研究日常睡眠限制对大鼠行为状态和生理稳态调节的短期和长期影响。具体来说，在这个实验室扩展以前的研究，我们将把注意力集中在两个相互依赖的生理系统;体温调节/能量代谢和呼吸系统。通过研究这些基本机制，我们希望深入了解睡眠债务可能介导或加剧健康状况的方式。

Sleep problems and disorders afflict over half of the adult population in the Western world, including Canada, with huge costs for individuals and society as a whole. Inadequate sleep has been linked to a wide variety of adverse consequences to health and quality of life. Despite this, research has thus far failed to provide a definitive answer to some very basic and important questions, including "how much sleep do we need?", "can we adapt to less sleep?", "what are the physiological mechanisms mediating the consequences of chronic sleep debt?" The proposed research is intended to work toward an answer to these questions.Most individuals that suffer from sleep problems experience ongoing fragmentation and/or insufficiency of sleep (chronic sleep restriction) rather than total sleep deprivation. Published research indicates that chronic sleep restriction has significant effects on human neurobehavioural performance and mental health. However, little attention has yet been given to the physiological consequences of chronic sleep restriction, in humans or animals, despite the known link between sleep problems and physical health (e.g. cardiovascular disease, obesity, Type 2 diabetes and suppressed immune responses). Hence, the main goal of the proposed research program is to investigate homeostatic physiological mechanisms in a rat model of chronic sleep restriction.Research in my laboratory has led to the development of techniques that are needed to achieve this goal. These techniques are designed to investigate short-term and long-term effects of daily sleep restriction on the regulation of behavioural state and physiological homeostasis in the rat. Specifically, extending previous research in this laboratory, we will focus our attention on two interdependent physiological systems; thermoregulation/energy metabolism, and the respiratory system. By studying these basic mechanisms we hope to gain insight into the way in which sleep debt may mediate or exacerbate ill health.