Association between sleep slow-wave activity and in-vivo estimates of myelin in healthy young men
Michele Deantoni,
Marion Baillet,
Gregory Hammad,
Christian Berthomier,
Mathilde Reyt,
Mathieu Jaspar,
Christelle Meyer,
Maxime Van Egroo,
Puneet Talwar,
Eric Lambot,
Sarah L. Chellappa,
Christian Degueldre,
André Luxen,
Eric Salmon,
Evelyne Balteau,
Christophe Phillips,
Derk-Jan Dijk,
Gilles Vandewalle,
Fabienne Collette,
Pierre Maquet,
Vincenzo Muto,
Christina Schmidt
Affiliations
Michele Deantoni
GIGA-CRC in Vivo Imaging, University of Liège, Belgium
Marion Baillet
GIGA-CRC in Vivo Imaging, University of Liège, Belgium
Gregory Hammad
GIGA-CRC in Vivo Imaging, University of Liège, Belgium
Christian Berthomier
Physip, Paris, France
Mathilde Reyt
GIGA-CRC in Vivo Imaging, University of Liège, Belgium; Psychology and Neurosciences of Cognition (PsyNCog), Faculty of Psychology, Logopedics and Educational Sciences University of Liège, Belgium
Mathieu Jaspar
ARCH, Faculty of Psychology, Logopedics and Educational Sciences, University of Liège, Belgium
Christelle Meyer
GIGA-CRC in Vivo Imaging, University of Liège, Belgium
Maxime Van Egroo
Faculty of Health, Medicine and Life Sciences, School for Mental Health and Neuroscience, Alzheimer Centre Limburg, Maastricht University, the Netherlands
Puneet Talwar
GIGA-CRC in Vivo Imaging, University of Liège, Belgium
Eric Lambot
GIGA-CRC in Vivo Imaging, University of Liège, Belgium
Sarah L. Chellappa
Department of Nuclear Medicine, Faculty of Medicine and University Hospital Cologne, University of Cologne, Germany
Christian Degueldre
GIGA-CRC in Vivo Imaging, University of Liège, Belgium
André Luxen
GIGA-CRC in Vivo Imaging, University of Liège, Belgium
Eric Salmon
GIGA-CRC in Vivo Imaging, University of Liège, Belgium
Evelyne Balteau
GIGA-CRC in Vivo Imaging, University of Liège, Belgium
Christophe Phillips
GIGA-CRC in Vivo Imaging, University of Liège, Belgium
Derk-Jan Dijk
Sleep Research Centre, University of Surrey, Guildford, UK; UK Dementia Research Institute, Care Research & Technology Centre at Imperial College London and the University of Surrey, Guildford, UK
Gilles Vandewalle
GIGA-CRC in Vivo Imaging, University of Liège, Belgium
Fabienne Collette
GIGA-CRC in Vivo Imaging, University of Liège, Belgium; Psychology and Neurosciences of Cognition (PsyNCog), Faculty of Psychology, Logopedics and Educational Sciences University of Liège, Belgium
Pierre Maquet
GIGA-CRC in Vivo Imaging, University of Liège, Belgium; Department of Neurology, University Hospital (CHU) of Liège, Liège, Belgium
Vincenzo Muto
GIGA-CRC in Vivo Imaging, University of Liège, Belgium; Corresponding authors.
Christina Schmidt
GIGA-CRC in Vivo Imaging, University of Liège, Belgium; Psychology and Neurosciences of Cognition (PsyNCog), Faculty of Psychology, Logopedics and Educational Sciences University of Liège, Belgium; Corresponding authors.
Sleep has been suggested to contribute to myelinogenesis and associated structural changes in the brain. As a principal hallmark of sleep, slow-wave activity (SWA) is homeostatically regulated but also differs between individuals. Besides its homeostatic function, SWA topography is suggested to reflect processes of brain maturation. Here, we assessed whether interindividual differences in sleep SWA and its homeostatic response to sleep manipulations are associated with in-vivo myelin estimates in a sample of healthy young men. Two hundred twenty-six participants (18–31 y.) underwent an in-lab protocol in which SWA was assessed at baseline (BAS), after sleep deprivation (high homeostatic sleep pressure, HSP) and after sleep saturation (low homeostatic sleep pressure, LSP). Early-night frontal SWA, the frontal-occipital SWA ratio, as well as the overnight exponential SWA decay were computed over sleep conditions. Semi-quantitative magnetization transfer saturation maps (MTsat), providing markers for myelin content, were acquired during a separate laboratory visit. Early-night frontal SWA was negatively associated with regional myelin estimates in the temporal portion of the inferior longitudinal fasciculus. By contrast, neither the responsiveness of SWA to sleep saturation or deprivation, its overnight dynamics, nor the frontal/occipital SWA ratio were associated with brain structural indices. Our results indicate that frontal SWA generation tracks inter-individual differences in continued structural brain re-organization during early adulthood. This stage of life is not only characterized by ongoing region-specific changes in myelin content, but also by a sharp decrease and a shift towards frontal predominance in SWA generation.
