image: Dr. Tracy Rupp wins the National Sleep Foundation Young Investigator Award. view more
Credit: Walter Reed Army Institute of Research
Dr. Tracy Rupp has won the 2008 National Sleep Foundation Young Investigator Award. A total of 106 abstracts from young sleep researchers (i.e., within 5 years of having obtained the doctoral degree) were submitted to the National Sleep Foundation (NSF). Each submission was rated by a team of 3 established sleep researchers. From among these abstracts, the top 16 were chosen (8 "clinical research" abstracts and 8 "basic research" abstracts) and the authors received an all-expenses-paid trip to the Young Investigators Conference (held last Sunday) by the National Sleep Foundation in Washington, DC, where the investigators made oral presentations to a panel of experts and an audience. Based on a variety of criteria ranging from 'scientific impact' to 'presentation style', the panel selected a "winner" and a "runner up" from each category (basic and clinical).
Dr. Rupp's winning entry in the basic research category was entitled "Sleep Extension Improves Performance and Facilitates Task Acquisition During and Following 7 Nights of Subsequent Sleep Restriction". In this work, Dr. Rupp showed that, contrary to current thinking, the recuperative value of extended sleep is "banked" until needed during subsequent sleep restriction.
As one of the two winners, Dr. Rupp will receive a small monetary award and will be treated to a week-long visit to the CDC in Atlanta.
Dr. Rupp is a National Research Council fellow. Dr. Rupp's award is clearly based on excellent skills and hard work. Her work also reflects very well on her mentor, Dr. Thomas Balkin, and her colleagues in the Department of Behavioral Biology, Division of Psychiatry and Neuroscience at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR).