The connection between poor sleep, memory loss and brain
deterioration as we grow older has been elusive. But for the first time, scientists at the
University of California, Berkeley, have found a link between these hallmark
maladies of old age. Their discovery opens the door to boosting the quality of
sleep in elderly people to improve memory.
UC Berkeley neuroscientists have found that the slow brain
waves generated during the deep, restorative sleep we typically experience in
youth play a key role in transporting memories from the hippocampus – which
provides short-term storage for memories – to the prefrontal cortex’s longer
term “hard drive.”