
One bad night’s sleep may increase levels of Alzheimer’s protein - dtawfik1
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2165911-one-bad-nights-sleep-may-increase-levels-of-alzheimers-protein/
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Bartweiss
The obvious question which isn't addressed in the article - do beta-amyloid
levels return to normal after some short span of good sleep?

Alzheimer's is associated with consistently elevated beta-amyloid levels,
while this study was about a short-term increase. It appears on a skim of the
study that the rate wasn't checked over later days, but is expected (from
rodent models) to go back down reasonably quickly. That's not a criticism of
the study - it's an interesting result linking the disrupted sleep patterns
seen in pre-Alzheimers to the protein levels seen in Alzheimer's, and it's
also the first study to directly study this link in humans.

It just seems like an important caveat because the New Scientist article is a
bit fuzzy on whether individual bad sleep events are being seen as a model
(yes) or a risk factor (not so far) for Alzheimer's.

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Puer
As someone who's been a chronic primary insomniac my whole life, I would not
be surprised if I die young despite being very physically fit and healthy. My
constant sleep deprivation has already taken a significant toll on my capacity
to concentrate and it was the bane of my life during high school/university.
It'd be interesting to find out what the actual physical state of my brain is
after operating for several decades on 2-4 hours of sleep every night.

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sametmax
I find the topic of insomnia fascinating because it's so alien to me. In the
Stephen King's book "Insomnia", the main character explains that you being
sleepy and tired can actually be uncorrelated. It's like saying that you can't
drink water when you are thirsty.

It's so weird.

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Puer
That's exactly it. I'm in a perpetual state of being "tired", but rarely ever
(outside of specific timing windows) in a state of being sleepy. This is
partly because I also have a correlated condition called "Delayed Sleep Phase
Disorder" which means my natural circadian rhythm is shifted (and
unfortunately not in alignment with social norms for when I should be alert
and asleep).

Sleepiness is the feeling you experience right before you actually fall
asleep; the overwhelming relaxation that drags you into the unconscious.
Tiredness is being too exhausted to feel or express emotion. You're awake, but
mentally absent, and incapable of completing any productive task. It's one of
the most frustrating feelings in the world to be unable to do something as
simple as sleep. I'm extremely jealous of the people, like my roommate in
college, who can seemingly will themselves into sleep within 5 minutes of
laying their head down.

My insomnia was especially difficult to deal with while I was in school
because it made me prone to stupid mistakes on exams. I would often misread or
glaze over important details, especially on any trick or multiple choice
questions, and in more than one class those little mistakes cost me grade
points. It also often didn't matter how much I would study as my memory
retention was horrible. Anyone who's read a book whilst tired can attest how
difficult it is to not only process the words on the page, but to remember
them for later.

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sametmax
I really want to experiment polyphasic sleep, but people that tried it always
say the first 2 weeks are hell.

Sounds like your entire life looks like those 2 weeks.

What kind of task can you perform that is not immediately 10 times harder
under those conditions ?

P.S: I'm like your friend, I sleep like a baby. Actually less than 7 hours of
sleeps makes me feel like crap.

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Puer
I don't really know if I can answer that question because I have no point of
reference to what's "normal." It wasn't until high school that I found out it
wasn't normal to take 3-4 hours to fall asleep every night. This is how I've
been my entire life.

Athletically I was able to compete with my track and soccer teammates without
issue, but lifting weights is an area I lack in because sleep is so important
to the development of raw strength. It isn't something I dwell on---I've lived
for it so long I've gotten over it--but I do sometimes wonder in a curious way
how much more I could have achieved without these sleeping issues. I used to
want to be a doctor, but with this condition achieving the grades necessary to
get into medical school was impossible (on a consistent basis, anyway).

~~~
pmoriarty
_" It wasn't until high school that I found out it wasn't normal to take 3-4
hours to fall asleep every night. This is how I've been my entire life."_

Do you drink caffeine or take any other stimulants?

They could definitely have an adverse effect on your sleep.

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Puer
Absolutely zero caffeine or stimulants. Caffeine makes me feel sick so I've
never gotten into the habit of drinking it and I've found it doesn't really
help my "alertness" when I'm tired anyway.

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dbingham
As a periodic insomniac, my insomnia is often triggered by stress, but then
fed by the fear of not sleeping.

I'll got to bed with my brain caught in some sort of stress loop that I can't
break. Then I have the thought "Oh shit, tonight's gonna be an insomnia night,
isn't it?" Just having that thought introduces a fuck ton of cortisol into my
system, creating a self fulfilling prophecy.

...all of these stories about the dangers of those missed nights of sleep
really don't help matters.

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thinkingemote
I find writing down with pencil in a notepad these running thoughts help. Then
if you get more, add them. I keep a notepad by my bedside table.

~~~
dbingham
Yeah, I've been using a combination of melatonin at bedtime and meditation.
Plus really good sleep hygiene: red light after 8pm, no screens after 9pm, bed
by 9:30 or 10pm every night (with few exceptions) get up with out an alarm
every morning (pretty consistently before 8 am) and take a vigorous 1 or 2
mile walk with the dog, no more than 1 cup or tea or coffee in the morning.

That all helps control it most of the time. But it doesn't help on those
really stressed out nights when I can't seem to break the thought loop long
enough to get into a meditative state.

I've tried the writing trick, but for me, my thoughts run way faster than my
pen can. I often find myself coming to after half an hour of staring at a
single paragraph and realizing that I've just been looping the whole time with
out writing anything.

I'm hoping I'll eventually get good enough at meditating that I'll be able to
break those loops, but in the mean time I tend to just try to keep stress low
enough that I don't get caught in them in the first place. Life just doesn't
always play along.

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tmikaeld
Could this be linked to the other studies that found Alcohol to be a big
contibutor to Demantia?

[http://www.bbc.com/news/health-43141457](http://www.bbc.com/news/health-43141457)

Since Alcohol disrupts sleep

~~~
Bartweiss
Offhand, probably not.

First, because the amyloid hypothesis is specifically about Alzheimer's-type
dementia, while alcohol appears to raise the risk of other dementia outcomes
as well.

Second, alcohol appears to be a much larger risk factor than other serious
sleep-deprivation or sleep-disruption situations from military service to
insomnia, suggesting that it's acting by some other mechanism.

Obviously this is a hard answer since we don't actually know what causes
dementia - at present, we can't even distinguish "sleep deprivation causes
amyloid plaques which cause Alzheimer's" from "Alzheimer's causes sleep
deprivation which causes amyloid plaques". But I think there's at minimum good
evidence that sleep issues aren't the primary mechanism for alcohol to cause
dementia.

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narkee
As a consequence, are people that have had children found to have higher
incidences of Alzheimer's?

~~~
bsbechtel
Anecdotal evidence in my grandmother's family indicates yes. 7 brothers and
sisters, and all women who had children in the family developed dementia late
in life.

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fsiefken
perhaps there was a genetic factor here?

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bsbechtel
It's entirely possible, but it didn't go unnoticed that the women of the
family who didn't have kids didn't develop dementia, and those who did have
kids did end up with it later in life.

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amelius
> It’s possible this protein helps cause the condition, or instead that the
> protein forms plaques in the brain in response to the disease.

So it might as well be that this protein is doing something good ...

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acd
I think decreased testosterone levels due to aging in combination with lack of
sleep in life causes Alzheimer’s but I cannot prove it.

Sadly have several family friends who has Alzheimers.

[https://www.webmd.com/alzheimers/news/20101008/low-
testoster...](https://www.webmd.com/alzheimers/news/20101008/low-testosterone-
linked-to-alzheimers-risk)

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plg
We have 2 kids. The youngest born 3.5 yrs ago, both of us > 40 at the time. My
spouse kept track of # consecutive nights until we experienced at least 2
nights of uninterrupted sleep (defined as at least one parent with 8 hrs
contiguous sleep 2 nights in a row).

489 days

Kid is 3y 9m now and still waiting for 5 consecutive days of uninterrupted
sleep.

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amai
This is clearly a sign on how important the glymphatic system is for the
brain: [https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/nedergaard-how-
th...](https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/nedergaard-how-the-brain-
dumps-its-trash-video/)

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ndh2
> _of 20 volunteers over the course of two nights_

Really? This is news?

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_bxg1
Correlation != causation. The headline totally neglects this to be more
sensationalist.

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jacobreg
They are testing causation. The researches deprived subjects of sleep on
predetermined nights and observed the results to be a buildup of this protein.

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_bxg1
Correlation between the proteins and Alzheimers. The headline doesn't outright
state that it's causal, but leaves plenty of room for people to jump to that
natural assumption.

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ccvannorman
According to this article, my body is 95% Alzheimer's protein due to living as
a startup founder

~~~
creep
So many gainz

