Sleep Flushes Toxins From the Brain

D-brief
By Breanna Draxler
Oct 18, 2013 5:41 PMMay 17, 2019 9:40 PM
sleep, brain

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Sleep doesn’t just clear your head. Scientists now say it literally flushes out waste and toxins that build up in your brain during the day. And your brain needs this beauty sleep more than you might think.

Neuroscientists peeked into the brains of conscious and unconscious mice using a technique called two-photon microscopy. When the mice drifted off, their brain cells actually shrank, expanding the spaces between them by 60 percent. That’s when cerebral spinal fluid flowed in and cleaned the pipes. As the Guardian explains,

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