Methods of Sleep Manipulation: Approaches to Understanding the Biological Functions of Sleep

TOPICAL COLLECTIONS

Guest Editor

Sara Aton

University of Michigan, Department of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology

Sara Aton is an Associate Professor in the Department of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology at the University of Michigan. The Aton lab is focused on how waking experiences and subsequent sleep affect information storage in the brain. Work in the lab is centered on sleep-dependent processes in the adult mammalian brain - response plasticity in thalamocortical circuits following novel sensory experience, and consolidation of hippocampally-mediated long-term memory following single-trial learning. These studies employ a combination of electrophysiological, opto- and pharmacogenetic, behavioral, biochemical, and computational techniques to elucidate the role of sleep in promoting brain plasticity. Dr. Aton’s PhD thesis research, which identified intercellular and intracellular signaling pathways required for neural network dynamics within the mammalian circadian clock, was carried out in the laboratory of Dr. Erik Herzog at Washington University in St. Louis. She then carried out postdoctoral research aimed at identifying cellular and network mechanisms for sleep dependent plasticity in the developing visual system, in the laboratory of Dr. Marcos Frank at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Aton is a longstanding member of the Society For Neuroscience, the Society for Research of Biology Rhythms, and the Sleep Research Society, and has received numerous research awards, including the Donald B. Lindsley Prize in Behavioral Neuroscience from the Society for Neuroscience and the Grass Foundation, an Alfred B. Sloan Foundation Fellowship, and an NIH New Innovator Award.

Collection Overview

The role of sleep for organismal function constitutes a major unsolved mystery of modern biology. A major experimental approach to clarifying sleep functions in human subjects and animal models is the experimental manipulation of sleep behavior itself. Overarching strategies for this include experimental sleep deprivation, sleep fragmentation, and state-targeted sensory, physiological, or pharmacological interventions. Methods for achieving these endpoints can vary widely, and this variability may lead to dramatic differences on the effect of these methods on the brain and body. This collection aims to further our understanding of different methodological strategies and assess their impact on the outcome of studies investigating sleep functions. Contributions to this collection will describe new approaches, compare their efficacy and specificity, and optimize their usefulness for specific species and experimental endpoints.