logo University of Zürich - Institute of Pharmacology and Toxicology
Section of Psychopharmacology and Sleep Research

Prof. Dr. med. Alexander Borbély

Institute of Pharmacology
and Toxicology
University of Zurich

Winterthurerstr. 190
8057 Zurich

Tel. (0041) 44 635 5960
Fax (0041) 44 635 5707

borbelypharma.uzh.ch)

Alexander Borbély

  

Main Goals, Keywords

Sleep regulation, circadian rhythm, EEG analysis, brain mapping, molecular genetic analysis of sleep, modeling of sleep and circadian rhythmicity. Sleep and regional cerebral blood flow assessed by PET (collaborative project with Clinic of Nuclear Medicine); sleep and EEG analysis in parkinsonian and pain patients before and after thalamotomy (collabora tive project with the Clinic of Neurosurgery), and in stroke patients (coll. with Clinic of Neurology, Univ. Bern).

Vice-president ("Prorektor für Forschung") of the University of Zurich since 2000.

Previous and Current Research

Sleep Recording

Figure: Screen-shot of human sleep recording The "History view" on the left is a summary of the entire time since the recording was started. In the example shown, the recording had been going on for roughly 1.5 hours. A first slow-wave sleep episode has already occurred (white peaks). The larger "signal view" to the right of the screen shows the last 20 seconds of the signals plus some additional values at the bottom.

Future Projects

Topographic analysis of the sleep EEG; search for use-dependent local features of sleep; sleep in mice devoid of prion protein; clinical sleep studies

Selected Publications

  1. Aeschbach D, Cajochen C, Landolt H, Borbély A A: (1996) Homeostatic sleep regulation in habitual short sleepers and long sleepers. Am. J. Physiol., 270:R41-R53.
  2. Tobler I, Gaus S E, Deboer T, Achermann P, Fischer M, Rülicke T, Moser M, Oesch B, McBride P A, Manson J C: (1996) Altered circadian activity rhythms and sleep in mice devoid of prion protein. Nature, 380: 639-642.
  3. Achermann P, Borbély A A: (1998) Coherence analysis of the human sleep electroencephalogram. Neuroscience, 85: 1195-1208.

Last update: 14. 02. 2005, Webmaster / Institute of Pharmacology and Toxicology