Sensorimotor performance is improved by targeted memory reactivation during a daytime nap in healthy older adults

Improvement of episodic memory retention by a memory reactivation intervention across the lifespan: from younger adults to amnesic patients.

“…The study of memory reactivation and stabilization at long delays in populations with memory deficits is absent. Only recent work examined memory reactivation in older adults with limited evidence (31,32,34). The current findings provide evidence that memory reactivation facilitates episodic memory stabilization and improves memory retention at long delays across the lifespan.…”

“…al. (32) showed that memory reactivation during a nap enhances skill performance. Others studies on episodic memory reconsolidation, indicated that memory reactivation strengthens the performance of older adults when tested two or seven days later (33,34).…”

Enhancing motor learning in people with stroke via memory reactivation during sleep.

“…Study participation involved two daytime testing/training sessions divided by a one-hour nap, during which half of participants received TMR throughout the nap (see Figure 1). This study was designed to include a one-hour daytime nap for three reasons: (a) REM sleep latency is typically after 60 minutes (Agnew et al, 1966) and is when apneas are more likely to occur and impair consolidation (Landry et al, 2014); (b) past TMR studies have found positive results from similar nap lengths (Antony et al, 2012; Batterink et al, 2016; Johnson et al, 2020); and (c) to increase the feasibility of potential future clinical use of TMR during various periods of sleep, whether a nap between sessions of therapy or during sleep at night. For the testing/training study sessions, participants remained seated in an armless chair with a backrest and were asked to throw small bean-filled balls with their nonparetic UE to targets as they appeared on a screen (200cm × 170cm) placed 3 m in front of the chair legs.…”

“…Improved functional neural network connectivity between these brain regions has been shown to occur in relation to improved task-specific performance in healthy young adults (Antony et al, 2012; Cousins et al, 2016; Diekelmann et al, 2011). In our prior research, we demonstrated that TMR during sleep can enhance performance of a nondominant UE throwing task in healthy younger (Johnson & Westlake, 2018; Johnson et al, 2019) and older adults (Johnson et al, 2020). What is still unknown is whether TMR can enhance skilled UE performance in individuals with a history of stroke.…”

The Intersection of Offline Learning and Rehabilitation

“…In addition, transcranial direct current stimulation during wake (Reis et al, 2009(Reis et al, , 2015Sandrini et al, 2014) and during post-encoding sleep (Marshall et al, 2004(Marshall et al, , 2006Göder et al, 2013;Westerberg et al, 2015), as well as repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation during wake (Turriziani, 2012;Sandrini et al, 2013), have previously been shown to enhance memory consolidation and reconsolidation. Other sensory stimulation techniques such as targeted memory reactivation (Rasch et al, 2007;Oudiette and Paller, 2013;Shimizu et al, 2018;Johnson et al, 2019aJohnson et al, , 2020Hu et al, 2020) and rhythmic auditory stimulation (Ngo et al, 2013;Ong et al, 2016) have been used during post-encoding sleep to enhance consolidation.…”