Do placebos alter sleep?

Motivation and placebos: do different mechanisms occur in different contexts?

This paper challenges the common assumption that the mechanisms underlying short-term placebo paradigms (where there is no motivation for health improvement) and long-term placebo paradigms (where patients value improvement in their health) are the same. Three types of motivational theory are reviewed: (i) classical placebo motivation theory that the placebo response results from the desire for...

Do corticosteroids really alter mood?

Optogenetically induced sleep spindle rhythms alter sleep architectures in mice.

Sleep spindles are rhythmic patterns of neuronal activity generated within the thalamocortical circuit. Although spindles have been hypothesized to protect sleep by reducing the influence of external stimuli, it remains to be confirmed experimentally whether there is a direct relationship between sleep spindles and the stability of sleep. We have addressed this issue by using in vivo photostimu...

Do calcimimetics directly alter bone remodeling?

SECONDARY HYPERPARATHYROIDISM is an almost inevitable consequence of untreated chronic kidney disease (CKD), resulting in disordered skeletal remodeling and mineralization defects. Thus, due to the high circulating levels of parathyroid hormone (PTH), both osteoblast and osteoclast surfaces may be augmented and ultimately bone volume may be reduced (11). In CKD, synthesis of 1,25 dihydroxyvitam...

Do all animals sleep?

Some animals never exhibit a state that meets the behavioral definition of sleep. Others suspend or greatly reduce 'sleep' behavior for many weeks during the postpartum period or during seasonal migrations without any consequent 'sleep debt.' Rats die from one form of sleep deprivation, but sleep loss has not been shown to cause death in well-controlled studies in other vertebrate species. Some...