Sleep pressure modulates single-neuron synapse number in zebrafish
Sleep is a nearly universal behaviour with unclear functions1. The synaptic homeostasis hypothesis proposes that sleep is required to renormalize the increases in synaptic number and strength that occur during wakefulness2. Some studies examining either large neuronal populations3 or small patches of dendrites4 have found evidence consistent with the synaptic homeostasis hypothesis, but whether sleep merely functions as a permissive state or actively promotes synaptic downregulation at the scale of whole neurons is unclear. Here, by repeatedly imaging all excitatory synapses on single neurons ...
Source: nature.com