Business Travel May Be Hazardous to Your Health Worried about airplane safety? Thinking of air traffic controllers and pilots who fall asleep, birds flying into engine intakes, intrusive and radioactive TSA body scanners, suicide bombers with explosives knitted into their underwear? Relax. Heavy personal business travel is far more likely to lead to your early […]
How to get the perfect nap Part II (5/16/11)
Sleep Inertia Ever wake up feeling that you’re not waking up? That parts of your brain do not want to and cannot rise from slumber, that alertness is far away? Welcome to the problem of sleep inertia. Sleep inertia can and often occurs when people wake up not feeling fully rested. In theory, if we’re […]
Do we fall sleep one neuron at a time? (5/11/11)
Sleep Is Local Think globally, act locally. That old political mantra also is true of the brain – including sleep. The American model of sleep is relatively simple – light switch on, light switch off. We go out “like a light,” or as others put it, “lie down and die.” Then the light switch goes […]
Controlling weight and diabetes requires real rest (5/9/11)
It’s No Fun to Fight the System “I’m sleeping less than I ever have and that’s gonna make me gain weight? You’re kidding! I have to use more energy to stay awake, so how does that cause weight gain?” I hear similar stories most days. It’s time for people to look at how their bodies […]
Is it a food or a drug? (5/3/11)
The Differences Between Food and Medicine Can foods be drugs and drugs foods? A popular definition of food might include these elements: Nourishment Taste Fuel Energy Materials Appetite Similarly, a popular definition of drug might include issues of: Medical Treatment Decreasing Symptoms Changing Risk Factors of Illness These different arenas sound pretty separable – yet […]