title: Sleep contributes to dendritic spine formation and elimination in the developing mouse somatosensory cortex.
abstract: Sleep is maximal during early postnatal life when rapid and extensive synapse remodeling occurs. It remains unknown whether and how sleep affects synapse development and plasticity. Using transcranial two-photon microscopy, we examined the formation and elimination of fluorescently labeled dendritic spines and filopodia of Layer 5 pyramidal neurons in the barrel cortex of 3-week-old mice during wakefulness and sleep. We observed high turnover of dendritic protrusions over 2 h in both wake and sleep states. The formation rate of dendritic spines or filopodia over 2 h was comparable between the two states. The elimination rate of dendritic spines or filopodia was lower during 2-h wakefulness than during 2-h sleep. Similar results were observed on dendritic protrusion dynamics over 12-h light/dark cycle when mice spent more time asleep or awake. The substantial remodeling of dendritic protrusions during the sleep state supports the notion that sleep plays an important role in the development and plasticity of synaptic connections in the mouse cortex.
authors: Molecular Neurobiology Program, Skirball Institute, Department of Physiology and Neuroscience, New York University School of Medicine, New York, New York, USA.
authors: Guang
authors: G
authors: Yang
authors: Wen-Biao
authors: WB
authors: Gan
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D000831:Animals, Newborn; D049229:Dendritic Spines / Q000502:physiology*; D051379:Mice; D008822:Mice, Transgenic; D036641:Microscopy, Fluorescence, Multiphoton; D009473:Neuronal Plasticity / Q000502:physiology; D011554:Pseudopodia / Q000502:physiology; D012890:Sleep / Q000502:physiology*; D013003:Somatosensory Cortex / Q000254:growth & development*; D013569:Synapses / Q000502:physiology; D014851:Wakefulness / Q000502:physiology*