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Updated: Mar 29, 2026

Noninvasive, High-throughput Determination of Sleep Duration in Rodents
Published on: April 18, 2018
Genetics of Sleep Disorders
Philip R Gehrman1, Brendan T Keenan2, Enda M Byrne3
1Department of Psychiatry, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, 3535 Market Street, Suite 670, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA.
Abstract:
Sleep disorders are, in part, attributable to genetic variability across individuals. There has been considerable progress in understanding the role of genes for some sleep disorders, such as the identification of a human leukocyte antigen gene for narcolepsy. For other sleep disorders, such as insomnia, little work has been done. Optimizing phenotyping strategies is critical, as is the case for sleep apnea, for which intermediate traits such as obesity and craniofacial features may prove to be more tractable for genetic studies. Rapid advances in genotyping and statistical genetics are likely to lead to greater discoveries in the near future.
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