ArticleScience (New York, N.Y.)2017
Ultrastructural evidence for synaptic scaling across the wake/sleep cycle.
Article in Science (New York, N.Y.), 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 311 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
311 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Development of insomnia in patients with stroke: A systematic review and meta-analysis.PloS one · 2024Pooled it
- Sleep deprivation increases levels of the synaptic density marker SV2A in the human brain.PLoS biology · 2026Trial
- Sleep EEG oscillations and synaptic plasticity in memory consolidation across NREM and REM sleep.Dialogues in clinical neuroscience · 2027Review
- Mechanisms of transcranial magnetic brain stimulation.Physiological reviews · 2026Review
- Article
- Sleep differentially modulates synaptic vesicle protein 2A and spine density across cortical regions and development.iScience · 2026Article
- Review
- Induction of cortical on/off periods in awake mice fulfills sleep functions.Nature neuroscience · 2026Article
- Temporal drift of sleep-wake representations in hypothalamic neuronal ensembles.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Two-factor synaptic plasticity enables memory consolidation during neuronal burst firing.PNAS nexus · 2026Article
- RAEM: random-access electron microscopy for revisitable 3D imaging.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Active zone plasticity couples sleep need to presynaptic hypophosphorylation.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Article
- Frontal synaptic plasticity: A new key to homeostatic sleep regulation.Neural regeneration research · 2026Article
- Impact of Aii Amacrine Cell Rewiring in a Pathoconnectome-Based Computational Model of Early Retinal Degeneration.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Nighttime sleep promotes mechanosensory habituation inbioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Learning, sleep replay and consolidation of contextual fear memories: A neural network model.PLoS computational biology · 2026Article
- Sleep deprivation alters hippocampal dendritic spines in a contextual fear memory engram.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Kv4.2The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2026Article
- Rocking-induced sleep enhancement promotes motor learning through transcriptional and synaptic remodelling.Communications biology · 2026Article
251 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
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Authors and funding
7 authors.
Funding
Abstract
It is assumed that synaptic strengthening and weakening balance throughout learning to avoid runaway potentiation and memory interference. However, energetic and informational considerations suggest that potentiation should occur primarily during wake, when animals learn, and depression should occur during sleep. We measured 6920 synapses in mouse motor and sensory cortices using three-dimensional electron microscopy. The axon-spine interface (ASI) decreased ~18% after sleep compared with wake. This decrease was proportional to ASI size, which is indicative of scaling. Scaling was selective, sparing synapses that were large and lacked recycling endosomes. Similar scaling occurred for spine head volume, suggesting a distinction between weaker, more plastic synapses (~80%) and stronger, more stable synapses. These results support the hypothesis that a core function of sleep is to renormalize overall synaptic strength increased by wake.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.