Sleep Induction by Mechanosensory Stimulation in Drosophila
Arzu Öztürk-Çolak,
Sho Inami,
Joseph R. Buchler,
Patrick D. McClanahan,
Andri Cruz,
Christopher Fang-Yen,
Kyunghee Koh
Affiliations
Arzu Öztürk-Çolak
Department of Neuroscience, Jefferson Center for Synaptic Biology, and the Farber Institute for Neurosciences, Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, PA 19106, USA
Sho Inami
Department of Neuroscience, Jefferson Center for Synaptic Biology, and the Farber Institute for Neurosciences, Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, PA 19106, USA
Joseph R. Buchler
Department of Neuroscience, Jefferson Center for Synaptic Biology, and the Farber Institute for Neurosciences, Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, PA 19106, USA
Patrick D. McClanahan
Department of Bioengineering, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA
Andri Cruz
Department of Neuroscience, Jefferson Center for Synaptic Biology, and the Farber Institute for Neurosciences, Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, PA 19106, USA
Christopher Fang-Yen
Department of Bioengineering, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA
Kyunghee Koh
Department of Neuroscience, Jefferson Center for Synaptic Biology, and the Farber Institute for Neurosciences, Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, PA 19106, USA; Corresponding author
Summary: People tend to fall asleep when gently rocked or vibrated. Experimental studies have shown that rocking promotes sleep in humans and mice. However, the mechanisms underlying the phenomenon are not well understood. A habituation model proposes that habituation, a form of non-associative learning, mediates sleep induction by monotonous stimulation. Here, we show that gentle vibration promotes sleep in Drosophila in part through habituation. Vibration-induced sleep (VIS) leads to increased homeostatic sleep credit and reduced arousability, and can be suppressed by heightened arousal or reduced GABA signaling. Multiple mechanosensory organs mediate VIS, and the magnitude of VIS depends on vibration frequency and genetic background. Sleep induction improves over successive blocks of vibration. Furthermore, training with continuous vibration does not generalize to intermittent vibration, demonstrating stimulus specificity, a characteristic of habituation. Our findings suggest that habituation plays a significant role in sleep induction by vibration.
