Sleep is indispensable for maintaining regular daily life activities and a fundamental physiological purpose in cognitive performance. Sleep deprivation (SD) may affect subsequent learning capacity and ability to constitute new memories, particularly in the situation of hippocampusdependent tasks. Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) is a non-invasive procedure of electromagnetic induction that generates electric currents activating nearby nerve cells in the stimulated cortical area. Several studies have begun to therapeutically use TMS. The present study was designed to evaluate how TMS could improve learning and memory functions after SD in O. degus. Thirty juvenile (aged eighteen months old) females were divided in three groups (control, acute and chronic TMS treatment -with and without SD). To immobilize TMS-treated groups, they were disposed in plastic cylindrical while the O. degus were receiving head magnetic stimulation. SD was achieved by gently handling the animals to keep them awake during the night. Behavioral tests include Radial Arm Maze (RAM), Barnes Maze (BM) and Novel Object Recognition (NOR). When TMS treatment was applied during several days, there was significant improvement of cognitive performance after SD. Noteworthy, only one session of TMS is able to improve some parameters related with spatial memory. No side effects were observed. After SD, chronic TMS treatment provokes significant amelioration in learning and in both spatial and working memory. Nonetheless, an acute treatment of TMS is already sufficient to improve spatial memory. To our knowledge, in this manuscript we confirm that sleep deprivation (SD) results in cognitive impairment measured with 3 different psychological tests, and we provide the evidence that transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) treatment significantly improve cognitive performance in sleep-deprived animals. Then, after SD, TMS can improve learning, spatial memory and working memory functions.We feel that these exciting results are novel and important, and can be of interest for scientists, neurologists and physicians working on sleep pathologies.The experimental work was done in compliance with the National Research Council's Guide for the care and use of laboratory animals, and the Guidelines promulgated by the European Communities Council Directive 2010/63/ECC.The data presented in the manuscript are original and the manuscript is not under consideration elsewhere. None of the manuscript contents has been previously published. In the present work we do not have any conflict of financial interest.All authors have seen and approved the manuscript.Trusting you will consider our manuscript worthy of review by your Journal, Yours truly, there was significant improvement of cognitive performance after SD. María-Trinidad HerreroNoteworthy, only one session of TMS is able to improve some parameters related with spatial memory. No side effects were observed. After SD, chronic TMS treatment provokes significant amelioration in learning and in both spat...

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