The brain may need sleep to repair DNA 'potholes' | Hacker News Reader

The brain may need sleep to repair DNA 'potholes'

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154 pointslaurex19 comments

> Research has shown that sleep is important for both mind and body. Sleep is vital for learning and memory and long-term sleep deprivation can lead to depression, compromised immune function and other chronic health problems.

As the father of three under 5, I can testify this is absolutely correct(!)

It's most apparent in young children. Children generally behave fine when they get good sleep and become monsters when they have just a few less hours. Often being overtired becomes a feedback loop where they refuse to sleep and then become even more exhausted.

> Often being overtired becomes a feedback loop where they refuse to sleep

Often it's true for adults too. When you're overtired, it's sometimes harder to sleep. But why should that be? It doesn't make sense. Any ideas?

There should be no reason to be overtired so your body reacts by keeping you awake to deal with it until the stressful events are over but this is stressful by itself. And modern city life has no shortage of stress.

My guess is cortisol and possibly anxiety surrounding sleep.

Part of it is when adults get worried about the lack of sleep, and they get stressed out, which keeps them awake. Cortisol is really good at it.

I'm always getting angry that most countries force many kids to be sleep deprived for ~12 years. I was one of them. I just can't operate properly before 10a.m. and even if I'm super tired it's very difficult to fall asleep before 1a.m. Furthermore my body wants 8-9 hours of sleep.

Research has shown it's not entirely possible to shift our inner rythm, so I really hope (more) schools start offering different timeslots for classes to start. I'm also confident there are enough teachers who willingly start two or four hours later and with flex time enough parents who happily bring their kids 2 or 4 hours later.

> Research has shown it's not entirely possible to shift our inner rythm

Source? Are you saying that when I move countries to a different time zone, part of me will always live by my previous time zone? Sounds like BS to me

It's still based on sunlight.

Then it can be spoofed, right? Most of us don't get sufficient sunlight exposure. I use a light therapy machine in the morning and try to spend time outside. Presumably in this modern age the efficient range for our circadian rhythms is a wide one.

https://www.vox.com/2016/3/18/11255942/morning-people-evenin...

The referenced 2017 paper is also super interesting: https://www.nature.com/articles/nrn.2017.55

Especially the section about the impact on "Reward and incentive processing" had some fun insights.

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