[Tyler]

Why Sleep is Needed to Form Memories
     


It's widely known that sleep is crucial to the formation of memories
but scientists haven't understood exactly why that was the case until now.
According to a news
release, researchers at the Pennsylvania School of Medicine have
discovered the answer at the molecular level. The discovery was made by
studying the neural response of animals with one eye blindfolded to a
color bar pattern (represented in the optical polar maps of the visual
cortex above). Researcher Marcos G.
Frank commented:
"We find that the biochemical  changes are simply not
happening in the neurons of animals that are awake. And when the animal
goes to sleep it's like you’ve thrown a switch, and all of a sudden,
everything is turned on that's necessary for making synaptic changes
that form the basis of memory formation. It's very striking."

It turns out a molecule called an N-methyl D-aspartate receptor
triggers a series of enzymes that allow neurons to make and break
connections, reorganizing the neural network. Not surprisingly, the
first thing suggested
after the discovery was the development of drugs that could mimick the
molecular events of sleep, eliminating the effects of not sleeping.
   

http://robots.net/article/2764.html