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Lack of sleep is always considered bad for the brain and health. A new study recently gave a more colorful image and direct elaboration on the consequence of sleep loss. Researchers said that it can trigger astrocytes, in which the brain starts eating itself.

Alzheimer’s Disease Or Dementia

A new study performed on mice, published in the Journal of Neuroscience directly gave evidence that lack of sleep may cause parts of the brain to commence on eating its other parts. This also increases the chance of chronic sleep loss sufferers acquiring Alzheimer’s disease or dementia anytime in life.

According to NDTV, the scientists involved in the experiment from Marche Polytechnic University in Italy compared the brains of three groups of mice. The first group was forced to stay awake for eight hours longer than usual and the other group was allowed to take sleep as long as they could. Lastly, the third group was forced to stay awake for five days at a stretch and finally they studied the brains of the three groups of mice.

Results From The Groups Were Surprising

The researchers have discovered that after an undisturbed sleep, astrocytes gradually became active by six percent of the synapses in the brains of the mice who were able to rest well later. On the other hand, the mice who were completely deprived of sleep had astrocytes more active around 13.5 percent of the brain synapses, as reported by PerfScience.

Later, they are able to show it for the first time that the portions of synapses are literally eaten by astrocytes  - simply because of lack of sleep. “We already know that sustained microglial activation has been observed in Alzheimer’s and other forms of neurodegeneration,” research leader Michelle Bellesi added.

The researchers concluded that lack of sleep can lead to Alzheimer’s disease or any sort of neurological disorders. It can harm the person both psychologically and physically. Hence, it is always better to ensure that you are not suffering from sleep loss and taking effective measures to ensure sound sleep.