Sleep is the single most effective thing we do each day to reset the health of our brain and body. It’s an extraordinary elixir that can help you age well and live longer. Here’s what we know about Mother Nature’s cure-all...
WHAT HAPPENS IF YOU HAVE TOO LITTLE SLEEP?
Short sleep is associated with an increased chance of having high blood pressure, a heart attack, and/or a stroke. Even the loss of a single hour of sleep can be heartbreaking, quite literally. There is a global experiment conducted on over 1.5 billion people across 70 countries twice a year. You know of this experiment. It is called Daylight Saving Time. According to a study published in 2014 in the journal Open Heart that looked at more than 42,000 hospital admissions for heart attacks, in the spring, when we lose an hour of sleep, there is a 24 per cent increase in heart attacks the next day.
Even your hormones take a turn for the worse when sleep is lost. Young healthy men sleeping just four hours a night for four nights end up with a level of testosterone equivalent to that of someone 10 years older, according to a small study published in the journal JAMA in 2011. In other words, inadequate sleep, even for a few nights, will ‘age’ a man by over a decade in terms of such hormonal virility. We see equivalent impairments in female reproductive health and hormonal profiles due to a lack of sleep.
Denne historien er fra May 2021-utgaven av BBC Focus - Science & Technology.
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Denne historien er fra May 2021-utgaven av BBC Focus - Science & Technology.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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Do We Finally Know How the Egyptian Pyramids Were Built? - A number of breakthrough studies are beginning to paint a picture of how these wonders of the world were built, but much of the story still remains a mystery...
A number of breakthrough studies are beginning to paint a picture of how these wonders of the world were built, but much of the story still remains a mystery...How the Egyptian pyramids were built has long been a mystery. Constructed as tombs for the pharaohs over 4,000 years ago, more than 100 of them remain. The largest one, the Great Pyramid of Giza, was originally 147m tall (482ft). It's made up of about 2.3 million stone blocks, each weighing between 2.5 and 15 tonnes, and would have had to be transported to the building site and lifted into place with techniques available at the time. To put this into context, it's akin to lifting a double-decker London bus to the top of St Pauls Cathedral a few million times.
An Artificial Heart Inspired by Plumbing - Mechanical circulation could revolutionise transplant design and reduce waiting lists
Mechanical circulation could revolutionise transplant design and reduce waiting lists. In July, this artificial heart was successfully implanted, for the first time, into a patient with end-stage heart failure. Built by The Texas Heart Institute (THI) and BiVACOR, the replacement organ has been dubbed the Total Artificial Heart (TAH). Although, being an implant rather than transplant, it's designed to temporarily support patients while they wait for a real heart transplant.
CHANGE THE (BODY) CLOCKS
Why the end of British Summer Time can be a wake-up call for our circadian health
ARE OCTOPUSES SENTIENT?
If you've watched the Netflix documentary My Octopus Teacher or been lucky enough to encounter an octopus in the wild, you'll know there's something special about them.
THE MEXICAN MOLE LIZARD
Imagine what would happen if an earthworm, a lizard, a snake and a mole went on a night out, had too much too much tequila and let their guard down.
ECLIPSES ON DEMAND
Inside an unassuming building, behind a damp car park in Antwerp, Belgium, scientists are teaching two spacecraft to be dance partners for a performance that will take place in front of the Sun.
How light's 'secret code' reveals the story of the cosmos
The starlight we can see tells us alot about the Universe, but it's the parts we can't see that contain the biggest revelations
Major Stonehenge discovery deepens mystery around ancient monument
New findings suggest a key six-tonne stone came from over 450 miles north of the circle
THE UNEXPECTED RETURN OF PNEUMATIC TUBES
Once a pioneering technology that revolutionised deliveries, pneumatic tubes had all but disappeared. Now they're back and enjoying a resurgence
LIVING FOSSILS
FOR SOME CREATURES ALIVE TODAY TIME HAS ALMOST STOOD STILL. MEET THE 'LIVING FOSSILS' THAT GIVE US A GLIMPSE INTO LIFE IN THE DISTANT PAST
