Professor Kazuhiko Kume, Professor Atsushi Tomita, and Shin Nakane (graduate student) in the Department of Neuropharmacy, Graduate School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Tsukuba are Professor Hiromasa Funato and Masashi Yanagisawa of the International Institute for Integrative Sleep Medicine (WPI-IIIS), University of Tsukuba. Announced that he discovered a gene that controls sleep and wakefulness in both mammals and insects in collaboration with the research group of the chief / professor. It was published in the online version of Nature magazine on November 11nd.
There are still many mysteries about sleep and arousal, and the fundamental principle has not been elucidated. So far, Professor Kume has been studying sleep in Drosophila, and Professor Yanagisawa has been studying sleep control mechanisms using mice.
The research team screened a large number of mice with random mutations and succeeded in establishing a Sleepy mutant family with significantly reduced wakefulness and a Dreamless mutant family with significantly reduced REM sleep.We discovered two gene mutations (Sik3 and Nalcn) that control sleep and wakefulness, and clarified their functions.
Furthermore, Sik3 acts on sleep control not only in mice but also in other animals such as Drosophila and nematodes, suggesting that Sik3 is universally involved in sleep control.We also found that in Dreamless mutant mice, the activity pattern of the region containing neurons involved in the termination of REM sleep was changed.It can be said that these are the first results in the world to discover genes that play a central role in sleep / wake control.
The discovery of a completely new gene involved in sleep / wake control in mice has great potential for solving sleep disorders.In addition, the fact that the same gene was shown to have the same function in Drosophila is expected to lead to the expansion of basic research and the elucidation of the mystery of sleep.
