March 1, 2018.
Your brain is particularly sensitive to lack of sleep, and when it is lacking, it can destroy itself. An Italian scientific study has just revealed it.
Can your brain eat itself?
When you sleep poorly, or too little, your brain destroys itself. This is the frightening conclusion reached by Italian researchers in a study published in the Journal of Neuroscience. And to illustrate their discovery, these researchers used a rather meaningful term since they explained that a brain that lacks sleep could literally eat itself.
To reach this conclusion, these researchers conducted experiments on four groups of mice. Some slept between 6 a.m. and 8 a.m., others slept intermittently, still others were sleep deprived for 8 hours, and the last group was kept awake for 5 days.
Lack of sleep implicated in the appearance of many pathologies
At the end of this observation, the researchers carried out analyzes on the brains of the guinea pigs, which showed that in those who had slept the least, the cells which are supposed to “clean” the brain during sleep, attacked the synapses, these areas of contact between neurons, which allow information to circulate.
This is not the first time that a lack of sleep has been implicated in the appearance of various disorders. Studies have already shown that sleeping too little can lead to decreased concentration and alertness. Lack of sleep can also lead to depression, overweight, weakened immune system, as well as diabetes, high blood pressure and some cancers.
Gaelle Latour
Read also Sleeping longer would be insufficient to make up for the lack of sleep
