Interdisciplinary Medical & Health Seminars

Although it might be quite intuitive that sleep is important for our immune system, research in this field is still in its infancy. Observational studies have found associations between a short sleep duration and an increased risk for the development of infectious and inflammation-related diseases. Experimental studies back up these findings and also elegantly demonstrated in human experiments the importance of sleep for the development of a long-lasting immune response following vaccination. However, the mechanisms underlying the effects of sleep on the immune system have still not been entirely elucidated. In this talk, I will present fundamental studies performed in the context of this young research field and will outline our current understanding of the relevance of sleep for the immune system.

Brain activity during sleep is characterized by circuit-specific oscillations, including slow waves, spindles, sharp-wave ripples or theta, that are nested in thalamocortical or hippocampus networks, respectively. However, the activity of other brain circuits is strongly modulated during sleep states. A major challenge is to determine the neural mechanisms underlying these activities and their functional implications. In this lecture, I will summarize our work on the dissection of the neural circuits underlying sleep-wake control, sleep oscillations and their relevance to brain plasticity associated with REM sleep, and discuss their relevance to proof-of-concept experiment where optogenetically-induced slow wave promoted brain plasticity and motor recovery after stroke in mice.