Pulling a sleepless night works like an antidepressant: Northwest study

Health

By Brooke Kato

Students, rejoice, your sleepless nights may have more benefits than earning you an A.

That all-too-familiar yet tired feeling from not getting enough sleep for just one night may actually have antidepressant effects, according to a study led by a team at Northwestern University.

Although chronic sleep deprivation has been studied extensively, scientists have become interested in studying the effects of temporary sleep loss, as the equivalent of a college student pulling an all-nighter before an exam, the author said. of the study and associate professor of neurobiology, Yevgenia Kozorovitskiy.

We found that sleep loss induces a powerful antidepressant effect and rewires the brain, Kozorovitskiy said in a statement.

This is an important reminder of how our casual activities, like an all-nighter, can fundamentally change the brain in just a few hours.

The study, published Thursday in the journal Neuron, analyzed the effects of short-term sleep deprivation on mice to identify areas of the brain that controlled sleep-induced behavioral changes, or lack thereof.

Mice without a predisposition to mood disorders and placed in an environment just stressful enough to keep them awake exhibited hyperactive, hypersexual, and aggressive behaviors compared to those that slept.

When studying the activity of dopamine neurons that control the reward response in the brain, mice that lost sleep also showed higher activity.

To determine which of the four regions responsible for dopamine was affected by sleep loss, the researchers silenced the medial prefrontal cortex.

On the other hand, there was no antidepressant effect.

This means that the prefrontal cortex is a clinically relevant area when searching for therapeutic targets, Kozorovitskiy said.

But it also reinforces the idea that has been developing recently in the field: dopamine neurons play very important but very different roles in the brain, Kozorovitskiy added. It’s not just this monolithic population that just predicts rewards.

Even one night of sleep deprivation resulted in persistent antidepressant effects that lasted for several days, as well as increased neuroplasticity.

However, according to Kozorovitskiy, the short-term benefits likely resulting from evolution are not a panacea.

After all, a chronic lack of adequate sleep has been linked to health problems such as cognitive decline or poor long-term mental health.

The effect of antidepressants is transient and we know the importance of a good night’s sleep, said Kozorovitskiy, who believes his team’s research will lead to better matches between patients and antidepressants.

I would say it’s better to go to the gym or take a nice walk.