{"id":702952,"date":"2026-05-24T16:31:14","date_gmt":"2026-05-24T20:31:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/?p=702952"},"modified":"2026-05-24T16:42:33","modified_gmt":"2026-05-24T20:42:33","slug":"review-spring-2026-science-of-sleep-glymphatic-system-702952","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/review-spring-2026-science-of-sleep-glymphatic-system-702952\/","title":{"rendered":"While you were sleeping: URochester reshapes the science of sleep"},"content":{"rendered":"

The University of Rochester\u2019s researchers and clinicians are helping us understand the science of sleep\u2014including how it might be one of the most consequential forces in human health.<\/h2>\n

The scientific establishment wasn\u2019t ready.<\/p>\n

It was the early 2010s, and Maiken Nedergaard<\/a> knew she was on the cusp of answering one of the most fundamental questions in biology: Why do we sleep?<\/em><\/p>\n

The neuroscientist and codirector of University of Rochester Medicine<\/a>\u2019s Center for Translational Neuromedicine<\/a> had discovered what she and her husband and codirector Steven Goldman<\/a> would dub the glymphatic system<\/a>, a biological \u201cdishwasher\u201d that scrubs the brain of waste during sleep. It was a finding so important that Science<\/em> magazine would list it among its 10 breakthroughs of the year in 2013.<\/p>\n

You wouldn\u2019t have guessed its importance if you\u2019d attended her prepublication talks at sleep conferences and meetings. She enthused to her colleagues about the idea of brain clearance, but they regarded her with open skepticism. \u201cThey were like, \u2018What is she talking about?\u2019\u201d Nedergaard recalls. \u201cPeople looked at me like I was crazy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yet the science was clear. Using sophisticated microscopy techniques to peer inside the brain, her work revealed a cellular cleaning cycle that flushes out toxic proteins primarily during sleep.<\/p>\n

\"Stylized
RINSE, REPEAT:<\/strong> The glymphatic system operates as the brain\u2019s built-in \u201cdishwasher,\u201d flushing out toxic waste during sleep. (Illustration by Bryce Wymer)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A decade and a half after those inauspicious meetings, Nedergaard\u2019s discovery has become an engine for research worldwide, generating nearly 2,000 scientific papers. About half of them, she notes with pride, are clinical papers that address the glymphatic system\u2019s role in diseases and conditions ranging from Alzheimer\u2019s and Parkinson\u2019s to strokes and migraines.<\/p>\n

On this early March afternoon, Nedergaard, who last year became URochester\u2019s 11th fellow of the National Academy of Inventors<\/a>, is busy preparing for the Oxford Glymphatic & Brain Clearance Symposium<\/a>. The event, built on her foundational research, has attracted 250 registrants and a 50-person waiting list. Nedergaard is the keynote speaker.<\/p>\n

Nedergaard\u2019s discovery is perhaps the most dramatic chapter in a story about sleep that has been building for a generation at URochester<\/a>. But it is far from the only one. In labs, clinics, classrooms, and beyond, the University has built a formidable concentration of expertise in sleep.<\/p>\n

And it is a story that is growing ever more relevant at a moment when people have moved from bragging about how little sleep they need to giving sleep its proper due as one of the essential pillars of health.<\/p>\n

The whys of zzzzs<\/h3>\n

Scientists had long wondered how the brain, which gobbles up about 20 percent of our body\u2019s energy, maintained itself. In the rest of the body, the lymphatic system works alongside the bloodstream to clear away waste. But the blood-brain barrier blocks that system entirely, leaving the brain without an obvious mechanism for cleaning itself.<\/p>\n

One long-held theory was that the brain had its own version of a lymphatic system that used cerebrospinal fluid. But the methods scientists had typically used to understand the process\u2014studying brain sections of dead animals\u2014had left plenty of unanswered questions.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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