Answer:
d. with just a few nights of sleep deprivation, but recovery will take more than a month of normal sleep
Explanation:
During sleep, the body heals itself, wear and tear of cells occur, and the chemical balance of hormones and neurotransmitters is restored. During sleep, the body prepares cytokines, that are protection and infection-fighting substances. Sleep deprivation prevents the production of cytokines and the ability to fight and prevent infections decreases. Sleep also enhances the T-cell responses which are associated with lymphocyte production pathway. Hence, people who remain awake have a lesser T-cell count due to decrease activation of T-cells. Hence, a few nights of sleep deprivation makes the immune system lack behind in the T-cell response generation. This low T-cell activity does not only impede the production of immune system cells but also reduces the functioning of existing cells such as decrease in cytokine functioning. Hence, the entire immune system cells needs a double amount of sleep functioning to keep track of immune system responses and rebuild the cells.
