Levente Kapás, M.D.
Levente Kapás, M.D. is an associate professor and researcher affiliated with the WWAMI Medical Education Program at WSU Spokane. He is the course chair for the histology curriculum for WWAMI first-year medical students. He also gives lectures about the nervous system.
Dr. Kapás’ research looks at the mechanisms that regulate sleep. He studies how hormones and signal molecules in the brain affect sleep and the biological clocks. He is particularly interested in those mechanisms that serve both sleep and metabolism.
Dr. Kapás graduated from medical school in his native Hungary, where he started his research career. In 1989, Kapás accepted an offer from his mentor to continue his work in Memphis, Tennessee, where he met current WSU sleep researcher James Krueger. Kapás later taught and continued his lab work at Fordham University in New York City before coming to Spokane in 2009.
Selected publications
Kapás, L., M. Shibata, M. Kimura, and J.M. Krueger. Inhibition of nitric oxide synthesis suppresses sleep in rabbits. Am. J. Physiol. 266: R151-R157, 1994.
Shemyakin, A. and L. Kapás. L-364,718, a cholecystokinin-A receptor antagonist, suppresses feeding-induced sleep in rats. Am. J. Physiol., 280:R1420-R1426, 2001.
Ribeiro, A.C. and L. Kapás. The effects of intracerebroventricular application of 8-Br-cGMP and LY-83,583, a guanylyl cyclase inhibitor, on sleep–wake activity in rats. Brain Res., 1049:25-33, 2005.
Kapás, L. and É. Szentirmai. Sleep regulatory factors. In: Monti, J., Sinton, C. and Pandi-Perumal, S. R. (Eds.), The Neurochemistry of Sleep and Wakefulness. Cambridge University Press, UK, 2008, pp. 315-336.
Szentirmai, É., L. Kapás, Y. Sun, R.G. Smith, and J.M. Krueger. The preproghrelin gene is required for normal integration of thermoregulation and sleep in mice. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 106:14069-14074, 2009.
For more of Dr. Kapás's publications: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?term=kapas%20l
