Grant: Travel Awards - Institute Community Support

The brain is composed of a very intricate network of cells that communicate together to produce behavior. One of these behaviors is sleep, and it can be subdivided into two types, rapid eye movement (REM) sleep and non-rapid eye movement sleep. Sleep disorders exert a considerable negative impact on both Canadians and the Canadian health care system. Understanding and treating these sleep disorders would alleviate a large financial burden. This research can improve personal health because it scientifically and clinically targets crucial unsolved questions of basic neuroscience and sleep medicine. Until now there was no way to manipulate specific cell types in particular regions of the brain. Understanding the cell types controlling sleep is fundamental to treating sleep disorders. Muscle paralysis is a defining feature of both the sleep disorder cataplexy and REM sleep. The current hypothesis of cataplexy presumes that the REM circuitry malfunctions and inappropriately activates during wakefulness leading to abrupt muscle paralysis. This is debilitating and dangerous to an individual as it affects their ability to work, socialize and perform typical day to day minutia. Cataplexy and REM sleep share very similar characteristics, however, their brain circuitry is not fully characterized. The goal of this project is to identify the neural circuit controlling REM sleep and cataplexy. This project will use a novel genetic tool in conjunction with classical neuroscience techniques to probe the functional roles of REM sleep brain circuitry, understand which brain regions breakdown, and how this breakdown leads to sleep disorders (e.g. cataplexy, REM sleep behavior disorder or sleep apnea). Our methodology allows our hypothesis to be tested in an unprecedented level, making this project one of the most comprehensive dissections of REM sleep circuitry to date.