PADILLA-GIL, Dora Nancy. The sleep: Physiology and homeostasis. []. , 15, 1, e06.   20--2024. ISSN 2027-4297.  https://doi.org/10.24188/recia.v15.n1.2023.985.

All animals have physiological and homeostatic mechanisms to generate, maintain, adjust and synchronize the endogenous/exogenous cycles sleep. Various areas of the brain are involved in the activation and regulation of the sleep/wake cycle and its synchrony with the light/dark cycle. All this activity is included in the biological clock (or circadian rhythm) of each animal, the which is modulated by genes, proteins and neurotransmitters. The sleep is related to the recovery or repair processes, maintenance and restoration of the efficiency of all the body systems, mainly of the nervous, endocrine and immune systems. Given the importance of the sleep for both the animals and humans, this article presents a review about the physiology and homeostasis sleep documented through scientific bibliography published in the last five years (2017-2022), in scientific journals such as Science and Nature, the databases PubMed, Science Direct, or the Scimago journal rankings. The sleep is regulated by exogenous and endogenous factors, in the latter are main actors the neurotransmitters (serotonin, histamine), neuromodulators (noradrenaline), hormones (orexin/hypocretin system, melatonin), glymphatic system, and genes that active the different signaling pathways so that neurons and glial cells in the brain work optimally.

: Brain; circadian clock; circadian rhythms; glymphatic system; homeostasis; melatonin; neurotransmitters; REM sleep; slow wave sleep.

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