Research
Genetic, molecular, and neural underpinnings of sleep and sleep deprivation
Appointments
- Associate Professor; Department of Integrative Biology and Physiology
Biography
Dr. Paul studies the genetic, molecular, and neural underpinnings of sleep. His primary interests are comprised of uncovering the mechanisms responsible for the negative effects of sleep deprivation in adults and children. He also probes the origins of gender/sex differences in the ability to recover from sleep loss to develop therapeutic targets for sleep disorders that disproportionately affect females.
His work has shown that sex differences in daily sleep amount are dependent on circulating reproductive hormones while sex differences in the ability to recover from sleep loss are relatively insensitive to them. Dr. Paul’s current research involves applying a forward genetics approach to uncover the core genes responsible for sleep-wake regulation and the impairing effects of sleep loss. Effective treatments for common sleep-wake disorders are elusive.
Dr. Paul conducts a forward genetics approach to facilitate gene identification that takes advantage of natural variation occurring in sleep-replete and sleep-deprived mice. This approach applies the most cutting edge genome mapping, positional cloning, and DNA sequencing techniques to identifying the genetic origins of unique sleep phenotypes in transgenic mouse models. These studies are expected to identify novel sleep regulatory genes and lead to the development of new therapeutic targets and improved treatments for sleep disorders.
Publications
- Wang, H, Paul, K, Kusters, C, Lill, CM, Zhou, J, Bronstein, J et al.. Gene-based association analysis of depression risk among European ancestry Parkinson's disease patients. Hum Genet. 2026;145 (1):. doi: 10.1007/s00439-026-02877-8. PubMed PMID:42888321 PubMed Central PMC13675371.
- Abac, AG, Abouelfettouh, I, Acernese, F, Ackley, K, Adamcewicz, C, Adhicary, S et al.. Direct Multimodel Dark Matter Search with Gravitational-Wave Interferometers Using Data from the First Part of the Fourth LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA Observing Run. Phys Rev Lett. 2026;137 (13):131001. doi: 10.1103/qdnd-rsnh. PubMed PMID:42854116 .
- Paul, K, Paping, J, Wacker, J. Variability in Preprocessing and Analysis of the Error-Related Negativity in Adult Response-Conflict Studies: A Systematic Review. Psychophysiology. 2026;63 (10):e70402. doi: 10.1111/psyp.70402. PubMed PMID:42850767 PubMed Central PMC13650170.
- Lin, Y, Yu, Y, Zhang, K, Del Rosario, I, Duarte Folle, A, Mayeda, ER et al.. Longitudinal untargeted metabolomics of cognitive impairment in Parkinson's disease. Alzheimers Dement. 2026;22 (10):e71890. doi: 10.1002/alz.71890. PubMed PMID:42836749 PubMed Central PMC13640969.
- Rajhans, A, Kye, E, Balu, V, Glanzman, DL, Paul, KN. Sleep and circadian regulation of DNA repair and retrotransposons in neuronal genome stability and neurodegenerative disease mechanisms. Front Neurosci. 2026;20 :1865440. doi: 10.3389/fnins.2026.1865440. PubMed PMID:42812864 PubMed Central PMC13621125.