Wakefulness articles within Nature Communications

Featured

• Article
  30 November 2023 | Open Access

  Wake slow waves in focal human epilepsy impact network activity and cognition

  Slow waves in sleep are crucial for homeostatic regulation of brain function. Here the authors show similar slow wave activity occurs during wakefulness in people with epilepsy to counter the impact of abnormal, epileptic, brain activity.

  • Laurent Sheybani
  • , Umesh Vivekananda
  •  & Matthew C. Walker

• Article
  27 October 2023 | Open Access

  Neuronal connected burst cascades bridge macroscale adaptive signatures across arousal states

  Here the authors describe a biophysical layer-5 pyramidal neuronal model linking microscale spiking to macroscale complex dynamics, that predicts distinct burst dynamics and information processing across unconscious, dreaming, and awake states.

  • Brandon R. Munn
  • , Eli J. Müller
  •  & James M. Shine

• Article
  24 April 2023 | Open Access

  Parasubthalamic calretinin neurons modulate wakefulness associated with exploration in male mice

  The neural circuits regulating wakefulness have not been fully resolved. Here, the authors reveal that neurons expressing calretinin in the parasubthalamic nucleus play a key role in the induction and maintenance of the awake state associated with exploration via projections to the ventral tegmental area.

  • Han Guo
  • , Jian-Bo Jiang
  •  & Wei-Min Qu

• Article
  17 April 2023 | Open Access

  Distinct astrocytic modulatory roles in sensory transmission during sleep, wakefulness, and arousal states in freely moving mice

  The contribution of astrocytic Ca²⁺ signaling to the modulation of sensory transmission in different brain states remains largely unknown. Here, the authors show two types of Ca²⁺ signals in the mouse barrel cortex with distinct function in sensory transmission during sleep and arousal states.

  • Fushun Wang
  • , Wei Wang
  •  & Jason H. Huang

• Article
  16 September 2022 | Open Access

  A temporal sequence of thalamic activity unfolds at transitions in behavioral arousal state

  How the brain transitions between sleep and wakefulness is not well understood. Here, the authors discover that a sequence of activity unfolds across the thalamus before transitions from unresponsiveness to active behavior.

  • Beverly Setzer
  • , Nina E. Fultz
  •  & Laura D. Lewis

• Article
  29 June 2021 | Open Access

  Predicting lapses of attention with sleep-like slow waves

  Attentional lapses occur in many forms such as mind-wandering or mindblanking. Here the authors show different types of attentional lapse are accompanied by slow waves, neural activity that is characteristic of transitions into sleep.

  • Thomas Andrillon
  • , Angus Burns
  •  & Naotsugu Tsuchiya

• Article
  09 March 2021 | Open Access

  Graded recruitment of pupil-linked neuromodulation by parametric stimulation of the vagus nerve

  Despite its wide and growing use, the mechanisms by which in vivo vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) exerts its therapeutic benefits are still largely unknown. Here, the authors show in mice that pupil dilation is a reliable and noninvasive biosensor for titratable VNS-evoked cortical neuromodulation by acetylcholine.

  • Zakir Mridha
  • , Jan Willem de Gee
  •  & Matthew James McGinley

• Article
  02 June 2020 | Open Access

  Role of serotonergic dorsal raphe neurons in hypercapnia-induced arousals

  Dorsal raphe 5HT(DR^Sert) neurons regulate arousal from hypercapnia by their projections to the neurons in the external lateral parabrachial nucleus (PBel) that are glutamatergic and also express calcitonin gene related peptide (PBel^CGRP). The DR^Sert input to the PBel modulates the arousal system to rising levels of blood CO₂, and may be mediated by 5HT_2a receptors on the PBel^CGRP neurons.

  • Satvinder Kaur
  • , Roberto De Luca
  •  & Clifford B. Saper

• Article
  01 July 2019 | Open Access

  Activating an anterior nucleus gigantocellularis subpopulation triggers emergence from pharmacologically-induced coma in rodents

  The reticular activating system (RAS) of the brainstem regulates wakefulness, and stimulation of RAS areas can reverse effects of anaesthesia. Here, the authors show that stimulation of a particular RAS area, the anterior portion of nucleus gigantocellularis, can produce arousal from deep coma.

  • S. Gao
  • , A. Proekt
  •  & D. W. Pfaff

• Article
  29 May 2018 | Open Access

  Regulation of cortical activity and arousal by the matrix cells of the ventromedial thalamic nucleus

  The ventromedial thalamus (VM) is thought to control cortical arousal through its diffuse projections to cortex. Here the authors record and manipulate the activity of calbindin1-positive matrix cells in VM and show that they bidirectionally regulate the sleep-wake transition.

  • Sakiko Honjoh
  • , Shuntaro Sasai
  •  & Chiara Cirelli

• Article
  20 April 2018 | Open Access

  Nucleus accumbens controls wakefulness by a subpopulation of neurons expressing dopamine D₁ receptors

  The nucleus accumbens regulates many behaviours that depend on arousal. Here the authors show that dopamine D₁ receptor neurons in the nucleus accumbens can directly regulate wakefulness.

  • Yan-Jia Luo
  • , Ya-Dong Li
  •  & Zhi-Li Huang

• Article
  10 November 2017 | Open Access

  Supramammillary glutamate neurons are a key node of the arousal system

  Supramammillary nucleus (SuM) neurons have been studied in the context of REM sleep but their possible role in mediating wakefulness is not known. Here the authors elucidate the distinct functional contributions of three subpopulations in the SuM on electrographical and behavioral arousal in mice using genetically targeted approaches.

  • Nigel P. Pedersen
  • , Loris Ferrari
  •  & Patrick M. Fuller

• Article
  17 October 2016 | Open Access

  Stereotypic wheel running decreases cortical activity in mice

  Sleep need is thought to accumulate gradually over waking periods and is associated with changes in neuronal activity. Here the authors show that in mice cortical firing rates increase between the beginning and end of wakefulness periods but this increase is not seen in waking periods with voluntary stereotypic wheel running.

  • Simon P. Fisher
  • , Nanyi Cui
  •  & Vladyslav V. Vyazovskiy

• Article
  03 November 2015 | Open Access

  Basal forebrain control of wakefulness and cortical rhythms

  The mammalian basal forebrain controls cortical rhythm and wake-sleep. Anaclet et al.use genetically-targeted chemogenetic systems to activate or inhibit cholinergic, glutamatergic or GABAergic neurons in this region, and reveal their contributions to behavioral and electrocortical arousal in behaving mice.

  • Christelle Anaclet
  • , Nigel P. Pedersen
  •  & Patrick M. Fuller

• Article
  11 August 2015 | Open Access

  Single-neuron activity and eye movements during human REM sleep and awake vision

  Since the discovery of rapid eye movements (REMs), a critical question endures as to whether they represent time points at which visual-like processing is updated. Here the authors demonstrate that cortical activity during sleep REMs shares many properties with that observed during saccades and vision.

  • Thomas Andrillon
  • , Yuval Nir
  •  & Itzhak Fried