Sleep Fragmentation in Neuronal Aβ42-Expressing Drosophila Replication Study (Stage 1 Registered Report)

Sleep disruption is increasingly recognized as an early feature of Alzheimer's disease (AD).Recent work reported that neuronal expression of human amyloid beta (Aβ42) in Drosophila melanogaster induces fragmented sleep prior to cognitive decline.This Stage 1 Registered Report proposes a direct replication of this sleep fragmentation phenotype using an adapted TrackedFlyBox™ video-based monitoring platform.We will quantify total sleep, daytime and nighttime sleep, and sleep architecture metrics including bout number and bout length in 2-3 day old adult flies across Aβ42-expressing and control genotypes.We hypothesize that neuronal Aβ42 expression leads to increased sleep fragmentation, characterized by increased bout number and reduced bout duration.This replication will provide high-quality evidence supporting fragmented sleep as an early biomarker of AD pathology.video tracking, we will measure whether these flies sleep in shorter, more fragmented bouts.The results will help validate sleep disruption as an early sign of Alzheimer's-like pathology.