Research Suggests Brain's Melatonin May Trigger Sleep (VIDEO)
Caption
This video, recorded at night, shows how sleep and wakefulness are monitored in zebrafish larvae. Individual larva are placed into each well of a 96-well plate, and the locomotor activity of each animal is monitored over several days and nights using an infrared camera. Larvae in the left half of the plate are wildtype, and thus mostly inactive and asleep. Larvae in the right half have a mutation that halts the production of melatonin and reduces sleep at night. As a result, most of these animals are awake and actively swimming.
Credit
David Prober/Caltech
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