Date: January 11, 2014

"As your body sleeps, your brain is quite actively playing the part of mental janitor: It’s clearing out all of the junk that has accumulated as a result of your daily thinking."

— Konnikova, Maria (b. 1984)

Date: January 11, 2014

"How, then, does its waste — like beta-amyloid, a protein associated with Alzheimer’s disease — get cleared? What happens to all the wrappers and leftovers that litter the room after any mental workout?"

— Konnikova, Maria (b. 1984)

Date: January 11, 2014

"'Think about a fish tank,' says Dr. Nedergaard. 'If you have a tank and no filter, the fish will eventually die. So, how do the brain cells get rid of their waste? Where is their filter?'"

— Konnikova, Maria (b. 1984)

Date: January 11, 2014

"If the main function of sleep is to take out our neural trash, that insight could eventually enable a new understanding of both neurodegenerative diseases and regular, age-related cognitive decline."

— Konnikova, Maria (b. 1984)

Date: January 11, 2014

"One day, scientists might be able to successfully mimic the expansion of the interstitial space that does the mental janitorial work so that we can achieve maximally efficient round-the-clock brain trash pickup."

— Konnikova, Maria (b. 1984)

Date: January 11, 2014

"It's [concerning sleep loss] like the difference between a snowstorm's disrupting a single day of trash pickup and a prolonged strike. No longer quite as easy to fix, and even when the strike is over, there's likely to be some stray debris floating around for quite some time yet."

— Konnikova, Maria (b. 1984)

Date: June 5, 2016

"Professor Sunstein's talk turned out to be a success, and his wife was on board when he decided to give book-length treatment to the ideas rattling around in his brain."

— Rosman, Katherine

Date: July 26, 2016

"But it is true that she told none of these types of personal anecdotes that help people watching at home form impressions from mental clay."

— Haberman, Maggie (b. 1973)