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Sleep deprivation impairs cAMP signaling in the hippocampus
Journal article   Open access   Peer reviewed

Sleep deprivation impairs cAMP signaling in the hippocampus

Christopher G Vecsey, George S Baillie, Devan Jaganath, Robbert Havekes, Andrew Daniels, Mathieu Wimmer, Ted Huang, Kim M Brown, Xiang-Yao Li, Giannina Descalzi, …
Nature (London), Vol.461(7267), pp.1122-1125
10/22/2009
DOI: 10.1038/nature08488
PMCID: PMC2783639
PMID: 19847264

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Abstract

Millions of people regularly obtain insufficient sleep 1 . Given the impact of sleep deprivation on our lives, understanding the cellular and molecular pathways affected by sleep deprivation is clearly of social and clinical importance. One of the major effects of sleep deprivation on the brain is to produce memory deficits in learning paradigms that are dependent on the hippocampus 2 – 5 . In this study, we have identified a molecular mechanism by which brief sleep deprivation alters hippocampal function. Sleep deprivation selectively impaired cAMP/PKA-dependent forms of synaptic plasticity 6 in the hippocampus, reduced cAMP signaling, and increased activity and protein levels of phosphodiesterase-4 (PDE4), an enzyme that degrades cAMP. Treatment with PDE inhibitors rescued the sleep deprivation-induced deficits in cAMP signaling, synaptic plasticity, and hippocampus-dependent memory. These findings demonstrate that brief sleep deprivation disrupts hippocampal function by interfering with cAMP signaling through increased PDE4 activity. Thus drugs that enhance cAMP signaling may provide a novel therapeutic approach to counteract the cognitive effects of sleep deprivation.
mouse sleep deprivation memory hippocampus PDE4A5 PDE4 rolipram synaptic plasticity phosphodiesterase cAMP

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