Work

Experimental sleep fragmentation impairs spatial reference but not working memory in Fischer/Brown Norway rats

Year: 2009

Type: article

Abstract: Sleep fragmentation is a common symptom in sleep disorders and other medical complaints resulting in excessive daytime sleepiness. The present study seeks to explore the effects of sleep fragmentation on learning and memory in a spatial reference memory task and a spatial working memory (WM) task. Fischer/Brown Norway rats lived in custom treadmills designed to induce locomotor activity every 2 min throughout a 24-h period. Separate rats were either on a treadmill schedule that allowed for consolidated sleep or experienced no locomotor activation. Rats were tested in one of two water maze-based tests of learning and memory immediately following 24 h of sleep interruption. Rats tested in a spatial reference memory task (eight massed acquisition trials) with a 24-h follow-up probe trial to assess memory retention showed no differences in acquisition performance but were impaired on the 24 h retention of the platform location. In contrast, the performance of rats tested in a spatial WM task (delayed matching to position task) was not impaired. Therefore, sleep fragmentation prior to testing impairs the ability to retain spatial reference memories but does not impair spatial reference memory acquisition or spatial WM in Fischer-Norway rats.

Source: Journal of Sleep Research

DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-2869.2008.00714.x

Authors: CHRISTOPHER P. WARD, ROBERT W. McCARLEY, ROBERT E. STRECKER

Institutions: Harvard University, VA Boston Healthcare System, University of Houston - Clear Lake

Language: English

Topic: Sleep and Wakefulness Research

Subfield: Cognitive Neuroscience

Field: Neuroscience

Domain: Life Sciences

Open Access status: green

Funder: National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute

Awards: G7136148244, G7425811036