
Your Fat Needs Sleep Too - danso
http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode.cfm?id=your-fat-needs-sleep-too-12-10-16&WT.mc_id=SA_sharetool_Twitter
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gxs
That's great news, it really is.

But I'm always curious as to the direction of causation.

I would love to sleep more - sure. If only it were that easy. I cannot get a
good night sleep for the life of me. Eliminating legumes and gluten, along
with a shitton of crossfit has left me with the best results so far.

I guess I'm not making too grandiose a point. All I'm saying is that people
that are over weight may not be sleeping well because they are over weight and
not the other way around.

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alwaysinshade
> I cannot get a good night sleep for the life of me.

Try low-dose Melatonin combined with 5HTP and stay away from backlit displays
for an hour before bed [1]. Large doses of Melatonin leave me groggy the next
day, but small doses give me a solid night of sleep and eliminates the bags
under my eyes. 5HTP seems to augment the effect and promote a more positive
mood the next day.

[1]
[http://news.rpi.edu/update.do?artcenterkey=3074&setappva...](http://news.rpi.edu/update.do?artcenterkey=3074&setappvar=page%281%29)

“Our study shows that a two-hour exposure to light from self-luminous
electronic displays can suppress melatonin by about 22 percent. Stimulating
the human circadian system to this level may affect sleep in those using the
devices prior to bedtime,” said Figueiro.

~~~
rogerbinns
Note that you can automatically adjust the display colour temperature to match
the time. I use this and it makes a huge difference.

On Linux use Redshift. On other operating systems use f.lux.

<http://jonls.dk/redshift/>

<http://stereopsis.com/flux/>

When you toggle/disable them you realise just what a difference it makes.

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aeturnum
I think sleep research is one of the most interesting areas. We still have no
clear explanation as to why we sleep, or what purpose sleep serves. The best
we can do right now is list the problems that arise if we don't sleep.

~~~
code_duck
I'm pretty sure it has something to do with living for millions of years in
this place that has a day/night cycle and how limited the crucial visual sense
is in the dark. Might as well save your power for when you are at your most
effective.

~~~
aeturnum
That's true to a certain extent, but sleep is more than just conserving
energy. People who don't or can't sleep start to have all sorts of problems.
There's something fundamental to how our bodies and brains work that we do
while we sleep, and that's interesting (doubly so because we don't understand
how it works).

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jcarpio
"after sleep deprivation, the cells became 30 percent less receptive to
insulin signals"

Let's see, insulin causes lypogenesis; signaling fat cells to store energy as
fat.

Sleep deprivation causes fat cells to be less receptive to insulin...

So, pass me the doughnuts while I stay up for the next week.

~~~
rafcavallaro
I know this was tongue in cheek, but:

insulin insensitivity = adult onset diabetes

so be prepared to have some toes or feet amputated (or to maybe just go blind)
if you stay up with those donuts.

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Cogito
I would love to see studies like this that further explore the relationship
between length of time spent sleeping and health/behavioural benefits.

For this study, did they choose 8.5 and 4.5 hours arbitrarily? Probably not,
but a comparison over more gradated time intervals would be really
interesting.

~~~
NDizzle
Coincidentally I can't sleep longer than 8.5 hours (no matter what) and if I
get 4.5 hours of sleep or less I'm absolutely worthless.

I'd have qualified for the study if it wasn't for that damn athletic
requirement!

~~~
Cogito
I think there is quite a body of literature around why 8-8.5 hours is a good
amount, what I really want to see is what the different benefits as functions
of sleep time looks like. That information would be invaluable for doing a
min-max optimisation.

6 hours tends to be my reasonable 'short sleep' time, where anything less and
I am significantly tired during the day, but I am easily capable of sleeping
all day if the opportunity arises. Usually, however, I think I get 7-8 hours,
which tends to be ok.

A big factor also seems to be breathing function throughout sleep. I think I
breathe poorly while sleeping and so don't have quite as good a sleep as I
could otherwise.

~~~
kahawe
> _where anything less and I am significantly tired_

From what I have read, the ideal amount of sleep needed is quite personal and
some people are fine with 6 to 7 hours while others just need 9 - but pretty
much all studies consistently showed that less than 6 is definitely not enough
and when sleeping less than 6 hours for a longer time you might even have
hallucinations and at the very least your overall performance will suffer.

So I think you are doing it right. You might want to experiment with those 90
minute sleep phase calculations like sleepyti.me or others.

> _A big factor also seems to be breathing function throughout sleep_

Absolutely! Sleep apnea is VERY serious and one of those things that prevent
you from getting a good night of sleep for a lot of (very) large people.

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elliott99
ZMA Max is pretty good. Though have given me the strangest REM dreams of my
life.

