LACK of sleep could accelerate the onset of Alzheimer’s disease by encouraging toxic plaques to develop in the brain.
Beta-amyloid protein is found in the brains of mice and humans. It causes the build-up of plaques, which some researchers think cause Alzheimer’s by killing cells.
David Holtzman of Washington University School of Medicine in St Louis, Missouri, and colleagues found that beta-amyloid levels were higher in mouse brains when the mice were awake than when they were sleeping.
Sleep deprivation also caused more plaques to develop, while an insomnia drug reduced the amount of plaque-forming protein (Science, DOI: 10.1126/science.1180962).…
