Pilot Study: Establishing Glutamatergic Changes in Rapid Antidepressant Effects of Sleep Deprivation
Public ClinicalTrials.gov record NCT05893173. Field values are reproduced from the official study page; the official ClinicalTrials.gov record remains the source of truth for eligibility, enrollment, and contact information.
Data is sourced from official ClinicalTrials.gov public API records. Always review the official ClinicalTrials.gov record for the latest information.
Official title
Pilot Study: Establishing Glutamatergic Changes as the Mechanism of Action in the Rapid Antidepressant Effects of Sleep Deprivation
Brief summary
Reproduced verbatim from the official ClinicalTrials.gov record. Not medical advice.
In the treatment of Major Depressive Disorder (MDD), total sleep deprivation can produce rapid but short-lasting improvements in mood. In order to develop a new generation of treatments with rapid and sustained efficacy, a better understanding of the mechanism of action is urgently needed. One candidate mechanism is the modulation of synaptic strength mediated by glutamatergic activity as sleep deprivation has been suggested to increase synaptic strength. Although determining how sleep deprivation impacts the glutamatergic system is essential to isolating its mechanism of action, the invasive nature of most assessment methods has limited our ability to do so in humans. The proposed research aims to determine if changes in glutamatergic activity, reflecting the modulation of synaptic strength, underlie the antidepressant effects of sleep deprivation. In this project, the investigators will utilize a novel measure of glutamate imaging, GluCEST, to assess changes in glutamatergic activity, in addition to using a proxy measure, waking EEG theta activity, to assess synaptic strength following total sleep deprivation. Ten individuals (aged 18-85) with a DSM-V diagnosis of MDD will undergo baseline GluCEST imaging and waking EEG prior to and following approximately 30 hours of total sleep deprivation. Both clinician-administered and subjective mood measures will be collected. It is predicted that sleep deprivation will improve mood and increase glutamatergic activity and synaptic strength. Results from this project have the potential to identify the modifiable mechanisms by which rapid antidepressants work which could ultimately stimulate the development of novel interventions that work through the modulation of glutamatergic activity.
Study identification
- NCT ID
- NCT05893173
- Recruitment status
- Completed
- Study type
- Observational
- Phase
- Not listed
- Enrollment
- 3 participants
Conditions and interventions
Conditions
Eligibility (public fields only)
- Age range
- 18 Years to 85 Years
- Sex
- All
- Healthy volunteers
- Healthy volunteers not accepted
This page does not interpret eligibility. Detailed inclusion and exclusion criteria are on the official ClinicalTrials.gov record.
Study timeline
- Start date
- Jun 18, 2023
- Primary completion
- Feb 1, 2025
- Completion
- Feb 1, 2025
- Last update posted
- Feb 26, 2025
2023 – 2025
United States locations
- U.S. sites
- 1
- U.S. states
- 1
- U.S. cities
- 1
| Facility | City | State | ZIP | Site status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| University of Pennsylvania | Philadelphia | Pennsylvania | 19104 | — |
Site contact phone numbers, emails, and investigator names are intentionally not displayed here. Open the official ClinicalTrials.gov record for site contact information.
About this trial record page
- What this page shows
- Public field values for ClinicalTrials.gov record NCT05893173, including study identification, conditions, interventions, eligibility (age, sex, healthy volunteer), timeline, and U.S. site list.
- What this page does not do
- No medical advice, eligibility judgments, treatment recommendations, study quality scoring, or AI-generated medical summaries. No site contact phone numbers, emails, or investigator names.
- Where the data comes from
- Sourced from the official ClinicalTrials.gov public API. The official record is the source of truth.
- Last refresh
- Last update posted Feb 26, 2025 · Synced Sep 7, 2026
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Open the official record
The complete protocol, eligibility criteria, and contact information for NCT05893173 live on ClinicalTrials.gov.