Sono e Dependências
Sleep Regulates Incubation of Cocaine Craving After withdrawal from cocaine, chronic cocaine users often experience persistent reduction in total sleep time, which is accompanied by increased sleep fragmentation resembling chronic insomnia. This and other sleep abnormalities have long been speculated to foster relapse and further drug addiction, but direct evidence is lacking. Here, we report that after prolonged withdrawal from cocaine selfadministration, rats exhibited persistent reductionin nonrapid-eye-movement (NREM) and rapid-eye-movement (REM) sleep, as well as increased sleep fragmentation. In an attempt to improve sleep after cocaine withdrawal, we applied chronic sleep restriction to the rats duringtheir active (dark) phase ofthe day, which selectively decreasedthe fragmentation of REM sleep duringtheir inactive (light) phase without changing NREM or the total amount of daily sleep. Animals with improved REM sleep exhibited decreased incubation of cocaine craving, a ph