Tyler Evans
Bio 1610
Every living organism needs sleep. Sleep is vital in success,health and happiness for everyone and everything. New technologies have lead us to groundbreaking information that humans can evolve and adapt to the sleeping habits of a little cavefish. The Pachón cavefish lives in deep and dark caves in central Mexico. These creatures eat little food and have scarcely any oxygen or light. The cavefish do not have eyes and they get around by lateral lines in the ocean and suppressing sleep.
Florida Atlantic University has been studying these cavefish and learning about the relationship between sleep and the sensory process. In their latest study they found suggests that the inability to block one's environment is one of the ways to lose sleep. Alex C. Keene a professor at FAU said, “ Our study suggests that differences and sensory systems may contribute to the sleep variability. It is possible that evolution drives sensory changes and changes in sleep or a secondary consequence, or that evolution selects for changes in sensory processing in order to change sleep.”
The Pachón cavefish have an environment that differentiates for typical surface fish. Cavefish have evolved to using enhanced sensory systems while having a reduction in sleep. A big reason for this is because nutritional availability and feeding behavior contribute to the evolution of a lack of sleep. If these fish sleep, they could miss out on rare opportunities to eat. Of the 29 different populations of cavefish that have been identified many of them evolved independently. The Pachón cavefish, the population a study, appear to have lost sleep due to increased sensory input, but not the other populations. James Jaggard, the first author on the graduation at FAU working with Keene said, “ this means that there are many different lose sleep or evolve a brain and we are going to search to identify these mechanisms.” This study of neural mechanisms generating this behavioral shift remained elusive.
For this study researchers recorded cavefish under inflated light setup in individual tanks. The video tracking told researchers the fish were inactive and they defined sleep as one minute of immobility. “ Humans block out sensory cues when we enter into sleep-like state,” said Keene he also gave us this example, “ We close our eyes and there are mechanisms in the brain to reduce auditory input. This is one of the reasons why a sensory stimuli like someone entering the room is less likely if you are asleep. Our thinking was that cavefish have to some degree lost this ability and this drives sleep loss.”
I have learned that our sensory inputs can alter our personal definition of sleep. These cavefish have evolved to a lack of immobility creating the same benefits of sleeping. While we sleep our bodies are recovering. It is more than just altering your sleeping environment it is teaching your body that sitting down and laying low is just as beneficial to your body compared to sleep. As humans we block out these sensory cues when we are sleeping. If we could sleep less but still be rested, think about how much we could accomplish.
Tyler Evans
Bio 1610
Every living organism needs sleep. Sleep is vital in success,health and happiness for everyone and everything. New technologies have lead us to groundbreaking information that humans can evolve and adapt to the sleeping habits of a little cavefish. The Pachón cavefish lives in deep and dark caves in central Mexico. These creatures eat little food and have scarcely any oxygen or light. The cavefish do not have eyes and they get around by lateral lines in the ocean and suppressing sleep.
Florida Atlantic University has been studying these cavefish and learning about the relationship between sleep and the sensory process. In their latest study they found suggests that the inability to block one's environment is one of the ways to lose sleep. Alex C. Keene a professor at FAU said, “ Our study suggests that differences and sensory systems may contribute to the sleep variability. It is possible that evolution drives sensory changes and changes in sleep or a secondary consequence, or that evolution selects for changes in sensory processing in order to change sleep.”
The Pachón cavefish have an environment that differentiates for typical surface fish. Cavefish have evolved to using enhanced sensory systems while having a reduction in sleep. A big reason for this is because nutritional availability and feeding behavior contribute to the evolution of a lack of sleep. If these fish sleep, they could miss out on rare opportunities to eat. Of the 29 different populations of cavefish that have been identified many of them evolved independently. The Pachón cavefish, the population a study, appear to have lost sleep due to increased sensory input, but not the other populations. James Jaggard, the first author on the graduation at FAU working with Keene said, “ this means that there are many different lose sleep or evolve a brain and we are going to search to identify these mechanisms.” This study of neural mechanisms generating this behavioral shift remained elusive.
For this study researchers recorded cavefish under inflated light setup in individual tanks. The video tracking told researchers the fish were inactive and they defined sleep as one minute of immobility. “ Humans block out sensory cues when we enter into sleep-like state,” said Keene he also gave us this example, “ We close our eyes and there are mechanisms in the brain to reduce auditory input. This is one of the reasons why a sensory stimuli like someone entering the room is less likely if you are asleep. Our thinking was that cavefish have to some degree lost this ability and this drives sleep loss.”
I have learned that our sensory inputs can alter our personal definition of sleep. These cavefish have evolved to a lack of immobility creating the same benefits of sleeping. While we sleep our bodies are recovering. It is more than just altering your sleeping environment it is teaching your body that sitting down and laying low is just as beneficial to your body compared to sleep. As humans we block out these sensory cues when we are sleeping. If we could sleep less but still be rested, think about how much we could accomplish.
I really like this article because I am mainly drawn to ecological posts, and how studying one species can lead to discoveries in other species. The fact that the other species in this case is humans is an even bigger draw to this article. There is one part of this article that had me a bit confused. At one point Professor Keene is quoted saying "It is possible that evolution drives sensory changes and changes in sleep...", and isn't this a bit backwards from everything we have learned about evolution this semester? What I mean to say is that isn't it the sensory changes and changes in sleep that this population of cavefish have adapted to that would drive the evolution, not the other way around?
ReplyDeleteBR
I don't think it's backwards from what we learned. I think it's forwarding our evolution. And to me, it seems like they said that they adapt to their surroundings or environment and those adaptions led them to evolve to survive in those conditions. So your question, in my opinion, is asking what was already stated, that sensory changes led to the evolution. Unless I'm reading this completely wrong.
DeleteAL
I think we could definitely accomplish more if we eliminated the amount of sleep needed to keep us healthy. However, if we were to adapt this behavior to ourselves, could it actually be harmful to humans?
ReplyDeleteWhat I mean to say is, perhaps we are not built to have sleep patterns like the cave fish, and maybe it would be less beneficial in the long run.
TD
TD,
DeleteI have thought the same things about less sleep for humans. The big difference to me is our environment for the most part doesn't encourage us to adapt to sleeping the very little hours of the cavefish. The Cavefish would miss the already limited food sources if the slept longer. So the reality is the Cavefish is in an environment that has made this species either evolve or die off.
TE
I was also thinking the same thing actually at first, but then i started thinking about what we learned in class. It made me think that the only traits that pass on to further generations are traits that either have no effect or are beneficial to our fitness. So right now it it true that if humans constantly live with dramatically less sleep, it it detrimental. In order for humans to adapt or evolve to function off of less sleep, like the cavefish, I would assume we would need some type of mutation that would enable us to function with less sleep, without the negative effects, and eventually it would take its place in the gene pool.
DeleteBR
Same thoughts friends. I found a study from Ying-Hui Fu about "short sleepers." She found a family with the autosomal dominant phenotype that slept 6 hours on average rather than the more than 8 hours of other average families. These people sleep less because of their genes. On the other hand, those who try to "train" their bodies to less sleep have been studied to have increased risk of obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure and cardiovascular disease. They found that short sleep is linked to the genes more than the desire. We could get our genes changed like they did to the tested mice... haha
DeleteI think in response to your question, but I believe that it could potentially have a negative impact if humans were to evolve that way because it would completely alter not only our mentality and how we think but also our psychological mindset as well and the overall way we think. Sleep is fundamental to the developmental stages of humans but also in our functionality. So in essence I think it could have negative impacts and be potentially harmful because it would require a reset of our chemistry.
ReplyDeleteSW
This is such an intriguing idea. Obviously humans are far from the point where we could exist without sleep, but it makes me wonder if it will ever happen. Not necessarily by evolution, but by some medical advancement. Maybe someday there will be medical procedure that will make it so you don't have to sleep to rejuvenate.
ReplyDeleteI think this article is very interesting. It does make me wonder what I would be able to accomplish if I didn't need to sleep so much. I also do wonder though if there might be more to these particular fish needing less sleep. I think perhaps another reason might be their brains and bodies are notes highly developed as ours and they require less energy to function.
ReplyDeleteKB
This makes me wonder if there have been any studies as to how this is related to the actual processes that happen during sleep? I know that in human beings, there are several different phases of sleep, with different waves (such as delta waves), but do these fish experience similar effects while in this "sleepless" state of rest? I think if so, it could definitely be applicable to human beings, however that also brings the question about how different our physiology is to theirs. Our brains are, I'm assuming, a lot more complex than most other animals, so maybe due to this complexity, it may or may not be possible for us to really accomplish something like this. I don't know though, but it is certainly something that's very interesting to think about. Many a night I wish I could be doing something other than sleeping, but alas, sleep is necessary.
ReplyDeleteEM
This article was very interesting it would be a scientific breakthrough if this were to happen. Like previous comments have stated there are varies sleep stages and wave patterns that we go through to get to REM sleep which is where we get the most sleep and rest that our body needs. I believe even though this is highly unlikely to become reality we might be able to make some advances to reduce time of sleep by analyzing human stages of sleep. There are many functions that occur while we sleep and most are necessary for our bodies to continue functioning properly, if we discover another way to do these functions we can also be another step closer. Scientist should analyze positive and negative side effects of the final conclusion of the research. This would be super awesome seeing how the experiments and results come to a conclusion.- EM
ReplyDeleteI did find this post really interesting. Since these type of fish don't have eyes they get around using lateral lines in the ocean. So are kind of like dolphins who can use theirs sense to navigate through the ocean, but they can see? I just wonder what other animals are like these fish.
ReplyDeleteMS
After some research I found interesting studies. They are just that, studies. Nothing has been solidified, but scientists do believe that these fish have a light sensitive organ in the pineal gland in their brains. So while they may not see the same as most animals, including fish they can still see, it just comes through differently because of the way their brains detect the light.
Delete-JC
I have thought a lot about sleep and heard that some people from the past only slept like 4 hours. Einstein being one of them. I have a theory that some people with ADHD only need four hours of sleep. This theory developed because me and my 2 ADHD kids are like this. When we are super focused on something we can go weeks or months on only 4 hours each night. Do you think it is because we enter that super rested state of being at other times in the day? Or we just get one REM cycle and thats all that is needed really?
ReplyDeleteHow can Pachón cavefish help us evolve to have little sleep while feeling like we had 8-9 hours of sleep? Are there possible ways of altering our brain to require less sleep? I ask these questions because it interests me that scientist can possibly alter characteristics of the body to imitate what evolution can do.
ReplyDeleteA.B
I don't think that the point of this type of evolution is to give us the feeling of a full nights sleep, rather I see it as more a way to feel more rested from just resting and thus resulting in less exhaustion. There is also the matter of the theory that we use sleep to process the day as compared to just resting. We are higher functioning beings and have much larger brains than these cave fish and so have more functions and retain more memories so this process would be very much different from the cavefish process.
Delete-BRYCE BROADHEAD
ReplyDeleteCOMMENT:
I found this interesting because I would like to enter Evolutionary Biology/ Paleontology, and if this could happen it would take millions of years. It's interesting that they don't have a technical version of sleep that is largely noticeable which would lead to us assuming that their metabolism is exponentially slower than our own. However if us as humans were to adapt to this similar version of "sleep", or rest as it were, I could knowledgeably assume that this could lead to large problems for many people of whose jobs require them to sit for long periods of time. Adversely I can easily see how beneficial it could be if the day consisted of more than the average 12.
ReplyDeleteCOMMENT:
I found this interesting because I would like to enter Evolutionary Biology/ Paleontology, and if this could happen it would take millions of years. It's interesting that they don't have a technical version of sleep that is largely noticeable which would lead to us assuming that their metabolism is exponentially slower than our own. However if us as humans were to adapt to this similar version of "sleep", or rest as it were, I could knowledgeably assume that this could lead to large problems for many people of whose jobs require them to sit for long periods of time. Adversely I can easily see how beneficial it could be if the day consisted of more than the average 12.
-Bryce Broadhead
Tyler, question...
ReplyDeleteHow can we incorporate the same tactics as these fish if we have no where near the same environment? Obviously, these fish evolved like this because they had to adjust to their living circumstances. We don't have to do that. I guess what would we have to change to start this evolution of little sleep? I think this is interesting because everyone is always looking for "more hours in the day." Here might lie the solution.