0 Are You Sleep Deprived?

How much sleep do you get? If you are one of the 35% of Americans who sleep less than seven hours a night, portions of your brain are going “off-line” even though you are still awake. Sleep is crucial to physical and mental health, and it is clearly visible in the brain activity. When we sleep, slow-wave activity appears in our brains as the neurons in the cortex switch themselves off and go silent. Wakefulness is when our neurons are on and generating spikes of electrical activity. Find out more about how sleep deprivation makes people and animals less functional.