ESRS 50th Anniversary JSR Special Issue Webinar

Dr. Christine Blume, University of Basel, Switzerland, sat with Journal of Sleep Research (JSR) Editor-in-Chief Prof. Dr. Dieter Riemann, University Hospital Freiburg, Germany, to talk about the recently released JSR Special Issue (Volume 31, Issue 4) in commemoration of ESRS’s 50th anniversary, and the upcoming webinar featuring select contributors. 

He started out describing fond memories he’s had over the almost four decades of being involved with ESRS and his reasons for maintaining membership, citing the networking and socializing opportunities as one of the major draws. He also touched on the Journal, the Special Issue and the upcoming webinar. 

Journal of Sleep Research 

He lauded his predecessors on the foundational work they did in establishing the JSR: Jim Horne, Derk-Jan Dijk and Peretz Lavie. By the time he took over 6 years ago, it was already an established journal with a stable impact factor of around 3. Earlier this year this increased significantly to 5.296, primarily due to the work of those who contributed articles. The Journal has steadily gained popularity and value over the years with increased article submissions and readership.

The special issue features a mix of articles on ESRS history, in addition to articles on sleep medicine and sleep research. This issue will also be distributed to all Sleep Europe 2022 attendees free of charge – another reason why you should register to secure your place there.

Webinar – 5 September, 15:00 CEST 

The webinar will feature several contributors of the JSR special issue and will include the following: 

Alex Borbely: Origin and relevance of the two-process model of sleep regulation 
The two-process model serves as a major conceptual framework in sleep science. He will describe how animal experiments aimed at exploring circadian oscillators led to the recognition of a sleep-wake-dependent process. Its interaction with a circadian process provided the basis of the two-process model. It was proposed that the emergence of sleep homeostasis provided an escape from the rigid control imposed by the circadian pacemaker.

Kerstin Hödlmoser: Memory consolidation during sleep 
Sleep has been demonstrated to play a significant role for memory consolidation and sleep scientists have started unravelling its underlying neurophysiological mechanisms. However, sleep remains a multidimensional phenomenon, and many questions remain left open for future research. In this presentation she will highlight the developmental trajectory of sleep-dependent memory consolidation processes, from their development in childhood to their potential impairments in ageing, and the nature and extent of our capabilities for information processing, learning, and memory reinforcement during sleep.

Dirk Pevernagie: OSA or OSAS? a half-century of progressing insight 
Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) and OSA syndrome (OSAS) were fully described by European researchers and investigators from Stanford university in the early seventies. OSAS was defined as the presence of obstructive respiratory events during sleep, as shown on polysomnography, in association with suggestive symptoms, e.g. excessive daytime sleepiness, and cardiometabolic complications such as hypertension. The operational definition thus seemed straightforward: OSAS = OSA + symptoms and signs. However, this equation proves problematic. Its application in clinical research and medical practice has produced equivocal outcomes. Nowadays we know that the pathophysiology of OSA is not tightly linked to clinical manifestations. OSAS appears to be a complex and heterogeneous disorder. Not all subjects with OSA require treatment, and for those who should be treated a personalized approach is recommended. 

Birgit Högl: RBD: Past, present and future 

Rapid eye movement sleep behaviour disorder (RBD) has evolved within a few decades from an interesting plain parasomnia to a main focus of research in sleep, neuroscience, neurodegeration and clinical neurology.

First named and described as a sleep disorder by Carlos Schenck and Mark Mahowald in humans, European sleep researchers around Michel Jouvet and the Lyon School, have provided the basic research model to understand this entity. Also even before it´s clinical description in humans, Europeans have contributed other clinical observations that would turn out later to be part of RBD

A lively international research activity has developed around biomarkers in RBD, in particular detection of novel, and evaluation of existing biomarkers with respect to their potential to predict (e.g. time and endpoint) conversion of clinically isolated RBD to full-blown manifest daytime neurodegenerative disease. Another promising research area is to detect RBD even earlier in its prodromal stage.

While in this fast growing research area important contributions come from multiple fields, for RBD, the area of sleep medicine and sleep research is of utmost importance and by far the most relevant one to promote RBD research.

Video-polysomnography is far more than the required diagnostic instrument RBD, it also holds high potential as a marker of progression, treatment response and to identify different phenotypes of RBD. Video-polysomnography is also the Gold Standard, against which screening instruments (traditional ones such as screening questionnaires or actigraphy,  or more novel approaches using artificial intelligence) have to be tested. In Europe, several research groups dedicate their work and activities to RBD, and experience the rewards and satisfaction of being able to both address the disorder clinically and contribute to advances in the area.