The Blood-Brain Barrier: Regulatory Roles in Wakefulness and Sleep.

Neuroscientist

2 Blood-Brain Barrier Group, Pennington Biomedical Research Center, Baton Rouge, LA, USA.

Published: April 2017

Sleep and its disorders are known to affect the functions of essential organs and systems in the body. However, very little is known about how the blood-brain barrier (BBB) is regulated. A few years ago, we launched a project to determine the impact of sleep fragmentation and chronic sleep restriction on BBB functions, including permeability to fluorescent tracers, tight junction protein expression and distribution, glucose and other solute transporter activities, and mediation of cellular mechanisms. Recent publications and relevant literature allow us to summarize here the sleep-BBB interactions in five sections: (1) the structural basis enabling the BBB to serve as a huge regulatory interface; (2) BBB transport and permeation of substances participating in sleep-wake regulation; (3) the circadian rhythm of BBB function; (4) the effect of experimental sleep disruption maneuvers on BBB activities, including regional heterogeneity, possible threshold effect, and reversibility; and (5) implications of sleep disruption-induced BBB dysfunction in neurodegeneration and CNS autoimmune diseases. After reading the review, the general audience should be convinced that the BBB is an important mediating interface for sleep-wake regulation and a crucial relay station of mind-body crosstalk. The pharmaceutical industry should take into consideration that sleep disruption alters the pharmacokinetics of BBB permeation and CNS drug delivery, being attentive to the chrono timing and activation of co-transporters in subjects with sleep disorders.

Download full-text PDF

Source
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1073858416639005DOI Listing

Publication Analysis

Top Keywords

bbb
9
blood-brain barrier
8
sleep
8
sleep disorders
8
sleep-wake regulation
8
sleep disruption
8
barrier regulatory
4
regulatory roles
4
roles wakefulness
4
wakefulness sleep
4

Similar Publications

Want AI Summaries of new PubMed Abstracts delivered to your In-box?

Enter search terms and have AI summaries delivered each week - change queries or unsubscribe any time!