Dr. Howard Smith Oncall

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/CzUJHuQRFLP/ An isolated night with little or no sleep seems to produce a “punch-drunk” state with accompanying mood elevation that lasts for days afterward.  Northwestern University neurobiologists report this seemingly paradoxical effect after reproducing this common human situation in a preclinical mouse model. After inducing acute sleep deprivation in the animals, analysis shows increased brain dopamine release and enhanced synaptic plasticity.  This biochemical brain rewiring is associated with a persistent happier mood which the animals evidence by hyperactivity and hypersexuality. The researchers remind us that chronic sleep deprivation is harmful so pulling repeated all nighters is not a strategy for treating a persistent gloomy outlook let alone clinical depression.  On the other hand, the effects of an isolated sleepless night may represent the persistence of a phenomenon whereby animals and prehistoric humans reacted with a predator threat with persisting v