Rythme circadien

Hungry for more? The brains behind Eat Like the Animals share smart nutrition strategies: An overnight fast “switches on the repair-and-maintenance pathways in your physiology that clear out the rubbish that accumulates in your cells, repairs DNA dam

every decade or so, the fitness world evolves and new buzzwords are created in the name of looking better, performing better, being healthier and living longer. Forty years ago, aerobics was the revolution du jour, followed closely by resistance trai

Ensuring you have a clean bill of health down there makes for healthier, happier years ahead. If you’re not across it, the Cervical Screening Test (CST) has replaced the pap smear. At your next appointment, your doctor will test you for the HPV infec

Having an internal clock that sets itself by the sun is great—but what happens when someone invents electric lights? Sometimes, bright light at night can fool the internal clock into thinking it’s day. This can make it harder for people to fall aslee

When is bedtime? If you don’t have a phone or watch, don’t worry. Inside every living thing is a clock that follows the sun. For a long time, people assumed that daylight told animals when to go to sleep or wake up. See light, wake. See dark, sleep.

Assuring a good night’s sleep starts the minute you wake up, or even earlier. That’s because you have a powerful internal 24-hour “clock” that affects your behavior and bodily functioning, including digestion, body temperature, and the sleep-wake pat

As the cold, wintry months stretch out ahead, it’s valid to approach them with a sense of doom. The days are dark, we’re living with restrictions and there are contagious viruses to contend with – from flu and common colds to the coronavirus. But it’

Growing old is tough when it comes to professional sport. Retirement can come early – like mid-40s, I hope – and that’s only if the body behaves. My body is the engine. But it’s the mind that starts the engine up every day, keeping it revving high an

From the wise words of Aristotle, “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” There’s no doubt you’ve heard it before, successful people owe their dues to a morning routine. Of course that’s not the only thing that m

Try to maintain a consistent sleep-wake cycle (and thus a consistent dark-light cycle) by going to sleep and getting up at the same time every day. Try not to deviate more than an hour on weekdays, and more than two hours on weekends. Get as much day

There’s a master clock inside your head. Tucked deep inside your brain, this expert timekeeper keeps all of the cells in your body running smoothly, protects you from chronic disease, and helps you have deep, rejuvenating sleep. To keep these systems

‘IS this about how much you hate me in the mornings?’ My husband, having spotted the title of this article, ventures an educated guess at its contents. I mean, he’s not wrong. Over the past seven years, he has tried his utmost to ‘convert’ me to his

WHILE OBVIOUS FACTORS can disrupt our sleep, such as too much coffee or a night on the tiles, research suggests the health of our gut may also have a significant impact on the sleep-wake cycle. It seems as though the trillions of microbes in our gut

There’s an old saying that preaches stress is the enemy of sleep. And given that 2020 hasn’t exactly been short on challenges for the majority of people, it makes sense that many of us are struggling to get the recommended seven to nine hours of shut

Are you a natural lark – up early in the morning, but waning in the evening? Or, are you an owl – cursing your alarm clock and struggling to fit in with the nine to five? It may seem like a lifestyle choice, but your chronotype – whether you’re an e

Do you find yourself looking for a quick, sugary pick-me-up or caffeine fix to power you through the afternoon? While eating a carb-heavy lunch can bring on the 3.30pm slump, your afternoon dip is largely due to your circadian rhythm. That’s a 24-hou

We take sleep for granted as a fundamental, but have you ever considered why we actually need to sleep at all? All creatures need sleep – to rest and recharge – but research suggests it’s actually much more important than this, and is inextricably li

We all know we need to sleep, and that if we don’t get enough we feel groggy and tired. And most of us know that lack of sleep over an extended period can bring about health problems. But did you know there’s a whole side to sleeping that it could pa

If you think your bedtime, when you rise, or the time that you tuck into lunch is all down to choice, you’re mistaken. It’s actually your body clock that is calling all the shots. ‘Almost every bodily function is governed by 24-hour biological cycle

Patients should get medicines when they’ll be most effective, not at the time that’s most convenient for clinicians.

You know a healthy diet, regular exercise and keeping extra weight off can benefit your diabetes management. But did you know your sleep habits also play a role in maintaining health? Proper sleep hygiene is an important aspect of self-care. Take thi

FOR AS LONG AS SEEMAY CHOU CAN REMEMBER, she has gone to bed at midnight and woken around 4:30 a.m. Chou long assumed that meant she was a bad sleeper. Not that she felt bad. In fact, sleeping just four hours a night left her feeling full of energy a

COVID-19 and its associated quarantine have disrupted pretty much every aspect of our lives. If you’re like plenty of people, that includes your sleep, with the pandemic bollixing up what might have been the most predictable and peaceful eight hours

FOR AS LONG AS SEEMAY CHOU CAN REMEMBER, she has gone to bed at midnight and woken around 4:30 a.m. Chou long assumed that meant she was a bad sleeper. Not that she felt bad. In fact, sleeping just four hours a night left her feeling full of energy a

COVID-19 and its associated quarantine have disrupted pretty much every aspect of our lives. If you’re like plenty of people, that includes your sleep, with the pandemic bollixing up what might have been the most predictable and peaceful eight hours

— The connection between mental health and physical activity is undeniable. A study on this connection, conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention from 2011 to 2015 with over a million adult participants, showed that people who exerc

The latest sleep craze to catch a buzz: circadian rhythm optimization (CRO). Proponents claim that tinkering with their circadian rhythm—the body’s natural daily cycle, dictated predominantly by exposure to light—by following a precise pattern of sle

When talking about your natural sleep/wake cycle – your body clock – it’s important to understand the concept of circadian rhythms. Named from the Latin term ‘circa diem’, meaning ‘approximately a day’, a circadian rhythm is a biological process that

Struggling with disrupted sleep? It’s understandable when we’ve lost our regular routines, many of us are working from home and trying to home school, and our sanctuaries – such as the kitchen and bedroom – have become rooms for work and teaching. “W

This is controlled by the suprachiasmatic nucleus, a tiny region of the hypothalamus that receives the day-night signal from light coming through our eyes and optic nerve, says Dr Bentley. It controls the network of other clocks in almost every organ