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Updated: Oct 21, 2025

Measuring Neural Mechanisms Underlying Sleep-Dependent Memory Consolidation During Naps in Early Childhood
Published on: October 2, 2019
Memory Consolidation Is Similar in Waking and Sleep
1Neuropsychiatric Institute and Brain Research Institute, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA.
Purpose Of Review:
I review the current status of the hypothesis that sleep is critically involved in memory consolidation and conclude that there are major methodological problems with the studies used to support this hypothesis.
Recent Findings:
Memory consolidation is similar in quiet waking and sleep (Humiston GB, Tucker MA, Summer T, Wamsley EJ. Sci Rep 18;9(1):19345, 2019), and suppression of REM sleep for long periods is compatible with learning and highly adaptive behavior (Lyamin OI, Korneva SM, Obukhova ED, Mukhametov LM, Siegel JM. Dokl Biol Sci 463:211-4, 2015; Lyamin OI, Kosenko PO, Korneva SM, Vyssotski AL, Mukhametov LM, Siegel JM. Current Biology 28(12):2000-5, 2018); despite their considerable abilities to navigate and remember, African elephants have very small amount of sleep, and learning interference effects have not been adequately controlled for in studies purporting to show sleep-dependent memory consolidation (Sosic-Vasic Z, Hille K, Kroner J, Spitzer M, Kornmeier J. Frontiers in psychology 9:82, 2018; Yonelinas AP, Ranganath C, Ekstrom AD, Wiltgen BJ. Nat Rev Neurosci 20(6):364-75, 2019).
Summary:
Memory consolidation clearly occurs in both sleep and waking. Whether, and the extent to which, consolidation might differ in these two states has not been conclusively determined.
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