New York: In what could lead to new treatment for sleep disorders, including insomnia, researchers have developed designer genes to remotely control neurons in a part of the brain responsible for deep sleep.

Half of all of the brain's sleep-promoting activity originates from the parafacial zone (PZ) in the brainstem, the findings showed. This is only the second “sleep node” identified in the mammalian brain whose activity appears to be both necessary and sufficient to produce deep sleep.