Department of Psychiatry, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Pittsburgh, PA.
Department of Psychology, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA.
Sleep. 2021 Oct 11;44(10). doi: 10.1093/sleep/zsab120.
Structural brain maturation and sleep are complex processes that exhibit significant changes over adolescence and are linked to many physical and mental health outcomes. We investigated whether sleep-gray matter relationships are developmentally invariant (i.e. stable across age) or developmentally specific (i.e. only present during discrete time windows) from late childhood through young adulthood.
We constructed the Neuroimaging and Pediatric Sleep Databank from eight research studies conducted at the University of Pittsburgh (2009-2020). Participants completed a T1-weighted structural MRI scan (sMRI) and 5-7 days of wrist actigraphy to assess naturalistic sleep. The final analytic sample consisted of 225 participants without current psychiatric diagnoses (9-25 years). We extracted cortical thickness and subcortical volumes from sMRI. Sleep patterns (duration, timing, continuity, regularity) were estimated from wrist actigraphy. Using regularized regression, we examined cross-sectional associations between sMRI measures and sleep patterns, as well as the effects of age, sex, and their interaction with sMRI measures on sleep.
Shorter sleep duration, later sleep timing, and poorer sleep continuity were associated with thinner cortex and altered subcortical volumes in diverse brain regions across adolescence. In a discrete subset of regions (e.g. posterior cingulate), thinner cortex was associated with these sleep patterns from late childhood through early-to-mid adolescence but not in late adolescence and young adulthood.
In childhood and adolescence, developmentally invariant and developmentally specific associations exist between sleep patterns and gray matter structure, across brain regions linked to sensory, cognitive, and emotional processes. Sleep intervention during specific developmental periods could potentially promote healthier neurodevelopmental outcomes.
大脑结构的成熟和睡眠是复杂的过程，在青春期会发生显著变化，并与许多身心健康结果有关。我们研究了睡眠与灰质的关系是否具有发展不变性（即跨年龄稳定）或发展特异性（即在特定的时间窗口内存在），研究范围从儿童后期到青年早期。
我们从匹兹堡大学的八项研究中构建了神经影像学和儿科睡眠数据库（Neuroimaging and Pediatric Sleep Databank，NPSD）（2009-2020 年）。参与者完成了 T1 加权结构磁共振成像（structural MRI，sMRI）扫描和 5-7 天的腕部活动记录仪，以评估自然睡眠。最终的分析样本包括 225 名没有当前精神诊断的参与者（9-25 岁）。我们从 sMRI 中提取皮质厚度和皮质下体积。从腕部活动记录仪中估计睡眠模式（持续时间、时间、连续性、规律性）。使用正则化回归，我们检查了 sMRI 测量值与睡眠模式之间的横断面关联，以及年龄、性别及其与 sMRI 测量值的相互作用对睡眠的影响。
睡眠持续时间缩短、入睡时间晚、睡眠连续性差与青春期不同大脑区域的皮质变薄和皮质下体积改变有关。在大脑的离散亚区（例如后扣带皮层），皮质变薄与这些睡眠模式在儿童后期到青春期早期存在关联，但在青春期后期和青年期不存在。
在儿童和青少年时期，睡眠模式和灰质结构之间存在发展不变和发展特异的关联，这些关联存在于与感觉、认知和情绪过程相关的大脑区域中。在特定的发育时期进行睡眠干预可能会促进更健康的神经发育结果。
