Julia Pabafikos
Mr. Ippolito
AP Biology Current Event
January 18, 2018
“Brain Circuit That Drives Sleep-Wake States, Sleep-Preparation Behavior Is Identified.” Stanford University Medical Center, 5 Sept. 2016, www.biologynews.net/archives/2016/09/05/brain_circuit_that_drives_sleepwake_states_sleeppreparation_behavior_is_identified.html.
A topic that seems to interest many researchers, parents and students worldwide is whether or not we are receiving the proper amount of sleep each night. Therefore, the article I decided to read was Brain Circuit That Drives Sleep-Wake States, Sleep-Preparation Behavior Is Identified studied in Stanford University. A reward system that is similar in all vertebrates and ultimately is able to connect most life on Earth is sleep, controlled by a chemical called dopamine which plays a crucial role in firing up this circuitry. Neuroscientists know that a particular brain structure known as the ventral tegmental area which is the origin of numerous dopamine-secreting nerve fibers which run in discrete tracts to many different parts of the brain. In order to further this research, scientists decided to introduce a study where the investigators used male laboratory mice bioengineered in several respects to enable the use of advanced technologies which remotely excite, suppress and monitor activity in the dopamine-secreting nerve cells from the mice's VTA. The researchers also measured the mice's overall brain activity and muscle tone to determine the mice's relative stages of sleep or arousal. Overall, activity in the dopamine-secreting nerve cells emanating from the VTA rose on waking and stayed elevated when mice were awake. However, this activity decreased when mice transitioned into sleep, remaining low throughout their sleep. Activating this nerve-cell population was enough to wake up the animals from a sound sleep and keep them awake for long periods. When instead the scientists suppressed activity in the same nerve-cell population during the typically active period of the mice's 24-hour cycle, the mice were put to sleep and remained asleep even through the presence of arousal triggers such as delicious high-fat chow or a female.
Although we are often exhausted it is challenging to finally find the ability to let ourselves fall asleep. Some 25 to 30 percent of American adults are affected by sleep disturbances of one type or another, according to the National Institutes of Health. Insomnia has become a multibillion-dollar market for pharmaceutical companies due to its treatment with drugs such as benzodiazepines that nonspecifically shut down the entire brain. This research strives to find the possibility of developing therapies that, by narrowly targeting this newly identified circuit, could induce higher-quality sleep. Another part of the experiment was putting the mice in an unfamiliar cage and recorded that they ordinarily explored their new surroundings energetically. "But the new study shows that at least one complex behavior is induced not by stimulating, but by inhibiting. Interestingly, this behavior -- nest building -- is essential to a mouse's preparation for sleep.” said De Lecea, the senior author or the study. Humans have a similar stimulation, for example, if we're disrupting this preparation by texting or playing video games it charges up our emotions and gets our VTA dopaminergic circuitry going therefore making it harder to fall asleep.
This article was both very informative and easy to understand due to its relevance did an amazing job stating the background information in order to attract his reader. The research team was able gave great examples that connected their research to people worldwide and ultimately proposed an alternative cure to insomnia. However, I believe that the research team should include even more specifics about their research and experiments in order for the audience to further understand how tedious and how crucial this research is to society. Additionally, I would recommend that they use more quotes from scientists/researchers working on this experiment in order to give a preview of what they plan to do in the future. I think that by adding quotes the article would be able to not only add some length but also further the point of this innovative research.
Hannah Beldotti
ReplyDeleteCurrent Event #15
Mr. Ippolito
February 5, 2018
“Brain Circuit That Drives Sleep-Wake States, Sleep-Preparation Behavior Is Identified.”
Stanford University Medical Center, 5 Sept. 2016,
www.biologynews.net/archives/2016/09/05/brain_circuit_that_drives_sleepwake_states
sleeppreparation_behavior_is_identified.html.
This week I chose to read Julia Pabafikos’ review on the article titled, “Brain Circuit That Drives Sleep-Wake States, Sleep-Preparation Behavior Is Identified,” by the Stanford University Medical Center. In the first paragraph of the review, Julia did a commendable job of concisely summarizing the article enough for the reader to understand the topic at hand. Also, in the last paragraph, she clearly states how the information presented in the article is valuable to readers. Additionally, Julia was able to criticize and commend the author for what was well done and areas of improvement. One area that I thought could have been improved upon, was the grammar throughout the current event review. For example when Julia writes, “A topic that seems to interest many researchers, parents and students worldwide is whether or not we are receiving the proper amount of sleep each night. Therefore, the article I decided to read was Brain Circuit That Drives Sleep-Wake States, Sleep-Preparation Behavior Is Identified studied in Stanford University.” The article that she states in the preceding sentence should have been placed in quotations. Another example is when she states, “Another part of the experiment was putting the mice in an unfamiliar cage and recorded that they ordinarily explored their new surroundings energetically. "But the new study shows that at least one complex behavior is induced not by stimulating, but by inhibiting. Interestingly, this behavior -- nest building -- is essential to a mouse's preparation for sleep.” said De Lecea, the senior author or the study. Humans have a similar stimulation, for example, if we're disrupting this preparation by texting or playing video games it charges up our emotions and gets our VTA dopaminergic circuitry going therefore making it harder to fall asleep.” Julia could have eliminated her grammatical errors in these sentences, such as when she begins a sentence with a quotation and does not use a comma when continuing the sentence after the quotation, by proofreading multiple times.
I was able to take away multiple things from the review I read. For example, I found the information, “Some 25 to 30 percent of American adults are affected by sleep disturbances of one type or another, according to the National Institutes of Health. Insomnia has become a multibillion-dollar market for pharmaceutical companies due to its treatment with drugs such as benzodiazepines that nonspecifically shut down the entire brain. This research strives to find the possibility of developing therapies that, by narrowly targeting this newly identified circuit, could induce higher-quality sleep,” highly informative and interesting. Overall, Julia wrote a great current event review on the article.
Cindy Kwok
ReplyDeleteCurrent Events 15
“Brain Circuit That Drives Sleep-Wake States, Sleep-Preparation Behavior Is Identified.”
Stanford University Medical Center, 5 Sept. 2016, www.biologynews.net/archives/2016/09/05/brain_circuit_that_drives_sleepwake_states_sleeppreparation_behavior_is_identified.html.
I read Julia’s critique of the article “Brain Circuit that Drives Sleep-Wake States, Sleep-Preparation Behavior is Identified”. One area that was well-done was her summary of the article. She did a good job with summarizing main events such as what was used to experiment, how the tests the scientists performed were done and the results. She noted exactly what the scientists were hoping to measure and explained the results thoroughly. Another area that was well done was that I liked how she had a specific topic in mind. In the beginning, she noted how this topic (sleep) was an area of interest for many, especially parents and teens, which helps to draw the readers into what the article is about. Lastly, I enjoyed the way Julia connected the topic and its importance to humanity. This was done very subtly at the beginning but she went into great depths in her second paragraph. She explained reasons why this topic is / should be important to us and added in statistics to back up her reasonings.
One area that could use work is something slightly minor but when she mentioned “ventral tegmental area”, she later simply rewrote it as VTA later on. Normally this isn’t a problem but in the critique, she never mentioned that the ventral tegmental area was also known as VTA and for long word, many times people tend to skim over them (as was my case). I read VTA later on and had to look back into her summary to find what it stood for which ruined the flow. Another area that could use work was her use of quotes. There was a lack of it in her summary and I felt the one used in her “relation to humanities” could have been chosen better (it could have easily been paraphrased rather than needing the quote).
Overall, Julia did a great job especially in relating it to our own lives. This is true with the new school scheduling where they tried to fit in more sleep but ended up changing everything (extra help) and now have earlier times (again) for days 3 and 4. This research will be useful in understanding more of the human brain and how it functions, and is important considering sleep takes up much of our lives.
Susie Goodell
ReplyDeleteMr. Ippolito
AP Biology
2/6/18
“Brain Circuit That Drives Sleep-Wake States, Sleep-Preparation Behavior Is Identified.” Stanford University Medical Center, 5 Sept. 2016, www.biologynews.net/archives/2016/09/05/brain_circuit_that_drives_sleepwake_states_sleeppreparation_behavior_is_identified.html.
Current Event 15
For this current event, I read my classmate Ellie’s review of the article “Brain Circuit That Drives Sleep-Wake States, Sleep-Preparation Behavior Is Identified” that was written by the Stanford University Medical Center. This piece discussed a recent study of the process by which the human body goes to sleep. Ellie wrote a wonderful review of this article. She included a great summary with background information that helped readers understand the context of the study. She also provided many details in her description of the experiment that the scientists performed and the results that they found. This allowed for readers to visualise what occurred and comprehend the information more easily. Ellie also analyzed the article well as she pointed out its strengths and weaknesses and then provided possible ways to improve the weak aspects.
Despite the successful aspects of this review, there are a few ways in which Ellie could improve it. First, she could have explained how this new study will affect scientists’ view of the process that puts the human body to sleep as well as the effect the results will have on treatments for insomnia. She mentioned that there will be more successful treatments to the problem, but she doesn’t describe how this particular study will cause this. Ellie also could incorporate more quotes into her review. Having direct statements from scientists or researchers on the project would provide more credibility to her explanations and predictions. It could also inform readers of how scientists will build on the results. However, Ellie did a wonderful job overall.
I chose to read this article because I am very interested in the processes that put us to sleep and wake us up. Insomnia is a problem for many people today and one that no one has a great solution to. My mom faces this inability to sleep frequently so she has tried many medicines and treatments to help her fall asleep faster, however, nothing works. This new study could provide for more successful treatments to this problem that many face.
Abbey Thomas
ReplyDeleteMr. Ippolito
AP Biology
6 February 2018
www.biologynews.net/archives/2016/09/05/brain_circuit_that_drives_sleepwake_states_sleeppreparation_behavior_is_identified.html.
For this week, I read Julia’s review on the Biology News article, Brain Circuit That Drives Sleep-Wake States, Sleep Preparation Behavior is Identified. Overall, Julia did a very good job on her review, but there were some aspect that really stood out. For example, in the opening paragraph, Julia included important background information on the sleep reward system and information previously known by researchers. By including this information, the rest of the review was easier to understand because I had the information needed to understand the new discovery. Along with including concise background information, in the beginning paragraph is also included how the experiment was done and the results of the experiment on mice. It was good that Julia included this information because it gives the reader an understanding of what happened, rather than just giving the reader the results. Lastly, in Julia’s second paragraph she connected the experiment done on mice to humans and the economy. Julia wrote that, “Some 25 to 30 percent of American adults are affected by sleep disturbances of one type or another, according to the National Institutes of Health. Insomnia has become a multibillion-dollar market for pharmaceutical companies due to its treatment with drugs such as benzodiazepines that nonspecifically shut down the entire brain”. She then goes on to explain how the findings from the experiment will be used to develop other therapies that specifically shut down parts of the brain.
While there were many parts to her review that were well done, there are some aspects that Julia could improve on. One thing that she could have done better is include more quotes from researchers or experts in the field because quotes will help support and strengthen her argument. One other piece of information that Julia could have added to her review of this article is why shutting down specifical sections of the brain is a more effective solution to treat insomnia.
There were many interesting facts and details in this response that I did not know before reading it. For example, I did not know that some many people in the United States are affected by insomnia, “some 25 to 30 percent of American adults are affected by sleep disturbances of one type or another, according to the National Institutes of Health”. 30% is a large portion of the United States, but it is not a topic that is discussed very often. Overall, Julia wrote an excellent review to the findings of the sleep preparation experiment.