What would happen if you didn’t sleep?

In 1964 Randy Gardner, a high school student in San Diego, California stayed awake for 264.4 hours or 11 days and 25 minutes; thus breaking the record for the longest a human has intentionally gone without sleep. Two of his classmates assisted him throughout this experiment by keeping him awake and monitoring his mental and physical state over this period. Alongside Randy’s two classmates was a Stanford researcher who flew down from Palo Alto when he learned of what Randy was doing. So what happened?The first day (unsurprisingly) Randy felt alert and awake however as the experiment progressed physical and mental symptoms of sleep deprivation started to become apparent. Randy first experienced a lack of focus; he then appeared to become more moody, snapping at his friends and becoming easily triggered by the slightest of events. Common tongue twisters became too difficult to recite. By only day four he began to hallucinate that he was a footballer and as the days went on Randy’s short-term memory also began to suffer tremendously and it became difficult for him to follow even a simple conversation. While Randy recovered without any long term physical or psychological implications for others who subject themselves to chronic sleep deprivation these effects can become more sinister.While there are very few of us who do not sleep at all, there are many of us who consistently do not receive enough sleep. Research suggests that chronic restriction of sleep to 6 hours or less per night results in cognitive performance deficits equivalent to two nights of total sleep deprivation. So while we may think we are getting enough sleep, even these moderate deficits in sleep periods appear to result in an impairment of waking neurobehavioral functions and we may not even be aware of it. It has even been suggested that driving while tired can be just as dangerous as driving while intoxicated in some cases.Other studies have suggested that chronically sleep deprived people (sleeping less than six hours a night) have an increased risk of stroke in comparison to those who receive approximately 7-8 hours sleep a night. Higher levels of inflammation and blood pressure are also commonly found in individuals who do not receive enough sleep. Furthermore, poor sleep and depression also appear to be closely linked with 60-90% of patients with depression suffering from insomnia.So what is going on in our brain that makes us need sleep? Well it has a lot to do with a particular molecule called adenosine. Adenosine is a neurotransmitter that has the effect of inhibiting many of the bodily processes associated with being awake. Adenosine is a by-product of using up our internal energy stores (from a molecule called adenosine triphosphate). Adenosine levels rise during wakefulness as sleep debt increases and then fall during sleep. It is believed that as the brain’s glycogen energy store is depleted throughout daily activity adenosine begins to build up. During sleep the adenosine is subsequently removed and replaced by new glycogen. Interestingly enough, caffeine actually works by blocking adenosine’s receptor pathways.While it is difficult to measure the effects of total and forced sleep deprivation on humans due to … ethics… this experiment has been performed on rats. In an experiment in which ten rats were subjected to total sleep deprivation for approximately two weeks or more the results were death. The cause of death was not proven but believed to be associated with whole body hyper-metabolism.So while there is still a lot to discover when it comes to sleep it appears that if we want to maintain our physical and mental wellbeing, sleep should be high on our list of priorities.