Sleep, fatigue, and NK cell activity in healthy volunteers: Significant relationships revealed by within subject analyses
Abstract
Poor sleep is thought to compromise health partially through its effect on immune function. Although experimental studies have shown that sleep deprivation reduces natural killer cell activity (NKCA) within individuals, cross-sectional studies of individuals in ordinary life have often failed to find such a relationship. The current study compared cross-sectional and longitudinal approaches to explore the association between sleep and NKCA. The relationship between NKCA and fatigue was also studied since individuals who are highly fatigued due to various clinical conditions often exhibit reduced NKCA. In the present study, fatigue and amount of sleep were assessed by self-report, and NKCA was assessed in peripheral blood samples collected from each of 45 healthy women at two time points approximately one month apart. Using cross-sectional analysis for each of the two sessions, sleep was related to NKCA only in the second session. Fatigue was not related to NKCA at either session. A within-subject design, however, revealed that an increase in the amount of sleep and decrease in levels of fatigue were related to an increase in NKCA. The current findings suggest that NKCA varies with amount of sleep or fatigue within an individual, and that this relationship may often be masked by large interpersonal differences in cross-sectional studies.
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Alternative routes of immune-to-brain signaling include activation of vagal and other neural afferents, cerebral endothelial and perivascular cells, and directed traffic of leukocytes to the brain.
“Alternative routes of immune-to-brain signaling are immunomediators that can activate vagal and other neural afferents, as well as cerebral endothelial and perivascular cells or the directed traffic of leukocytes to the brain (70, 503, 523, 586).”
From The Sleep-Immune Crosstalk in Health and Disease (2019) · cites this paper as [503]
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- Authors
- Shakhar, K., Valdimarsdottir, H. B., Guevarra, J. S., & Bovbjerg, D. H.
- Affiliations
- Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai (US)
- Corresponding author
- Shakhar, Keren
- Venue
- Brain, Behavior, and Immunity
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2007-02
- Volume
- 21
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 180-184
- ISSN
- 0889-1591 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2056766509
- Cited by
- 35
- References
- 29
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2025: 1 · 2023: 3 · 2022: 1 · 2021: 3 · 2020: 3 · 2019: 2 · 2017: 1 · 2016: 1 · 2015: 3 · 2013: 4 · 2012: 1
- FWCI
- 1.26
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Brain Behavior and Immunity (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institutes of Health (5r25ca081137-15)
- U.S. Army
- National Cancer Institute (CA81137)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Sleep and Work-Related Fatigue
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Sleep and Wakefulness Research
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Sleep and related disorders
- Keywords
- sleep, fatigue, NK cell cytotoxicity, sleep deprivation, immune function, within-subjects design, healthy women, interpersonal differences
- MeSH terms
- Adult, Cross-Sectional Studies, Data Interpretation, Statistical, Fatigue, Female, Humans, Killer Cells, Natural, Longitudinal Studies, Middle Aged, Reference Values, Sensitivity and Specificity, Sleep, Reproducibility of Results, Patient Selection
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