For thousands of years before humans harnessed electricity and created light bulbs, people rose and slept based the sun. This seems to be the natural rhythm humans were designed to follow.
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learning
Jun
28
2011
Insufficient sleep isn’t a ‘badge of honor’
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Experts have long suspected that part of the process of turning fleeting short-term memories into lasting long-term memories occurs during sleep. Now, researchers at the RIKEN-MIT Center for Neural Circuit Genetics of MIT’s Picower Institute for Learning and Memory have shown that mice prevented from “replaying” their waking experiences while asleep do not remember them as well as mice who are able to perform this function.
The work, which has a profound implication in the century-old search for the purpose of sleep, will be reported in the June 25, 2009 issue of Neuron.
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Feb
19
2009
Video imaging provides dynamic view of airway obstruction in those with sleep breathing disorder
A video imaging technique demonstrates that the soft palate, the tissue at the back of the roof of the mouth, is more elongated and angled in patients with obstructive sleep apnea both when they sleep and when they are awake, according to a recently published report.
“Obstructive sleep apnea is a common form of sleep-breathing disorder characterized by repetitive episodes of partial or complete upper airway obstruction,” the authors wrote in the article. The condition usually causes breaks in sleeping, reduced blood oxygen levels and daytime sleepiness, and may contribute to cognitive (thinking, learning and memory) difficulties, psychosocial impairments, trouble driving, heart disease and death.
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As the new school year approaches, the National Sleep Foundation (NSF) and Awake In America encourage parents and kids to put healthy sleep on the list of back-to-school necessities. NSF and Awake In America recommend gradually adjusting sleep schedules in order to be alert and energized as well as to assure optimal learning, participation and health.
“Kids tend to sleep and wake up later during the summer, making the transition to the school-year sleep schedule difficult,” explains Awake In America’s President, Michele Narcavage. “As tempting as it is to enjoy sleeping late in the final days of summer break, getting up earlier for school will be much easier if kids begin adjusting their sleep schedules now.”
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People with obstructive sleep apnea have been reported to have increased markers of oxidative stress and exhibit architectural changes in their brain tissue in areas involved in learning and memory. Chronic intermittent hypoxia in rats produce similar neurological deficit patterns.
“Obstructive sleep apnea has been increasingly recognized as a serious and frequent health condition with potential long-term morbidities that include learning and psychological disabilities,” wrote David Gozal, M.D., professor and director of Kosair Children’s Hospital Research Institute at the University of Louisville, lead author of the article.
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Evidence is mounting that sleep, or even a nap, may actually enhance information processing and learning.
New experiments by National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) grantee Alan Hobson, M.D., Robert Stickgold, Ph.D., and colleagues at Harvard University show that a midday snooze reverses information overload and that a 20 percent overnight improvement in learning a motor skill is largely traceable to a late stage of sleep that some early risers might be missing.
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