Featured Review Cellscience Reviews Vol 4 No 2 ISSN 1742-8130

Recent Developments on Slow Wave Sleep and Memory Consolidation:
More Than Modest Ripples

The evidence that sleep, particularly slow wave sleep (SWS), intersects with memory consolidation is building. Recent studies using sleep deprivation, brain imaging and stimulation during SWS, and in vivo electrophysiology demonstrate that slow wave activity (SWA) during NREM sleep undergoes experience-dependent changes and that increasing SWA during SWS can actually improve performance of some long-term memory tasks. This review covers some of the recent data supporting a role for SWS in memory consolidation while raising questions as to the mechanisms by which the natural homeostatic drive for sleep impinges on or collaborates with the consolidation process.

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