Why Sleep Deprivation Kills
quantamagazine.org
quantamagazine.org
So I skipped directly to the figures and section of the story that talks about changes in ROS levels in gut.
On a cold morning this winter, Rogulja leaned over a tablet in her office, her close-cropped dark hair framing a face of elfin intensity...
Oof. Now there's a phrase that belongs in a Lyttle Lytton entry.
This is how writers write when they're writing to show of their craft. Of course us uncultured laymen are not going to appreciate it the same way that someone who just wants to build a shelf to put their crap on is not going to appreciate a 45min YouTube video where somebody looking to show off fine woodworking spends an entire weekend building a shelf and someone who wants to just make an omelette is not going to enjoy a video where a master chef freezes frame every 10sec to narrate about the technique needed to wiggle it just right in order to make butter to brown the image of the Mona Lisa into the thing.
Whether "performing one's craft in a manner that showcases the capabilities of one's craft" is appropriate for the context is a matter of opinion.
When will journos dawn on that we don't care about their morning bagels?
I bet that tl;dr extension that would allow to jump directly to highlights (or mark them) would be pretty popular. If anyone knows one, please share.
I suspect this works better in print when you sit down with a cup of tea and a copy of the New Yorker
[0] https://www.cell.com/cell/pdf/S0092-8674(20)30555-9.pdf?_ret...
The article has more than that of course - it's a leisurely introduction to the people behind the discovery and the effort they put it. Nothing wrong with that, it's a worthy story in its own right. But when you click on the headline "Why Is the Human Brain So Efficient?" so discover the 32 words answer to the question in the headline is buried in a 3000 word human interest story, you may feel a little cheated.
If you want to tell a story please just write a book, I don't need your clickbait wrapped up in a quaint little story.
"in their own tubes live other sleepless flies, animated with the calm persistence of those consigned to eternal day." - This hurts my head. This author does not understand communication.
Like I now know that spaced repetition systems that people uses for studying was a product of Soviet era research by a Polish academic.
Though whether it's a warm morning or not is kinda useless to me.
They may have addressed this, and I just missed it. But in general I agree that this isn't the best format for describing this type of research to nonspecialist readers. I don't mind a slight dose of human-interest fluff, but the facts should come first.
(I take it from the patented HN instant downvote that the article did, in fact, answer my question, and I just missed it.)
As far as I know, those are the main hard rules of downvoting.
The other thing is that you don't seem to be able to downvote comments which are a direct reply to your own comment (although you can up-vote them). You can downvote replies-of-replies though.
Or it just incentivizes them to click on your profile, click through to comments and down-vote everything not in direct reply.
Arguably that's a higher bar of caring but once that bar is exceeded it's far more damaging to civil discourse because then you've got factually correct technical comments down-voted into oblivion because that person happened to also commit WrongThink(TM) in the comments on an unrelated contentious subject.
You could also argue that it's an incentive to wait a day before taking a minority opinion on a divisive subject but I'm not sure that's something we want to be incentivizing.
I think probably the most important thing is that it clearly communicates what the expected behavior is. I don't think it's immediately obvious that downvoting a response to you is would be considered impolite. (After all, people down-vote things because they happen to disagree all the time; what's the difference if it's in response to something you wrote or in response to something someone else wrote?) But if it's clear that's the social norm, I think most people would just go along with it.
Adding an extra few seconds to retaliation probably does have an effect, but only on people who would consider breaking the social norm anyway.
EDIT: dang answers directly (500 or 501): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8381148 (2014)
I try to save downvotes for posts that are actively abusive or hurt the discussion (by being abusive). Not just for stuff I don't like or I find 'low effort' (although I understand why others might have different standards). I also try to be generous with upvotes for everyone who participates with me in good faith.
Oh, well.
'On a cold morning this winter, Rogulja leaned over a tablet in her office, her close-cropped dark hair framing a face of elfin intensity'
[1] https://www.nccih.nih.gov/health/antioxidants-in-depth
[2] https://www.webmd.com/drug-medication/news/20070227/antioxid...
It doesn't tell much about the long term effects of low levels of sleep deprivation.
Abstract video summary by the senior author here:
- Sleep deprivation leads to ROS accumulation in the fly and mouse gut
- Gut-accumulated ROS trigger oxidative stress in this organ
- Preventing ROS accumulation in the gut allows survival without sleep in flies
[1] https://www.cell.com/cell/pdf/S0092-8674(20)30555-9.pdf?_ret...
By reading the actual paper I learned that apparently melatonin and lipoic acid fared best at extending survival without giving any additional sleep. Another interesting observation from the paper is that anti-oxidants didn't affect lifespan of non-sleepdeprived fruit flies.
Barf. This kind of straw-manning is all too common in science journalism. IANAS but I know that normal metabolism generates free radicals (electron-greedy molecules), which then steal electrons from anything they touch, causing damage. If that damage isn't repaired regularly, then our basic metabolic pathways breakdown, and we die.
I'm sure there are mysteries to unpack beneath this, but why treat the reader to a moronic underrepresentation of the state of the art?
Just because we might be able to remediate this one mechanism in the gut doesn't mean we can solve sleep. What about memory formation? Or immune system effects of sleep?
Exercise daily, starting today.
Ditch or at least dim all screens a few hours before going to bed. Hard ban on screens when unwillingly awake in the middle of the night. Paper books are okay.
Look into techniques to fall asleep, this article helped me: https://www.artofmanliness.com/articles/fall-asleep-fast/. The article and the research it cites are male-oriented, women may try it more speculatively. Intuitively it seems to me that gender differences should not be relevant.
Septum surgery helped my sleep enormously by making breathing easier, see if it's for you.
Hard ban on stimulants, including sugar and coffee, a few hours before going to bed. Hard ban on stimulants when unwillingly awake in the middle of the night. For a severe case such as yours, consider a hard ban after midday, or even a complete permanent ban.
Currently, I try to take a walk at least 30 minute everyday in the morning and then I do the 7-minute-workout in the afternoon, even when I have no energy. My sleep's improved for the past couple of months since I started this workout routine. I can't tell if it's because of that or my sleep just improves on its own but I'll keep doing it since exercising is better than doing nothing. I also started 18:6 intermittent fasting. That might also have helped.
Still, my improved sleep means about 5 to 5.5 hours (sometimes less) a night with at least 2 awakenings in between. My normal sleep was about 8 hours with 1 awakening, and I'd still nap in the afternoon if given the opportunity. Now, I can't nap and there's no rebound sleep (i.e. I don't sleep more the next day because I sleep very little the day before). It's a pretty messed up situation and doctors haven't found anything abnormal from medical tests, including MRI and EEG. Sleep study indicated 50% sleep efficiency, reduced REM and deep sleep, but no sleep apnea or any common cause.
I tried the 2-min fall asleep method when my condition first started but it didn't really help. And yes, I only drink green tea and have some chocolates before lunch time in terms of stimulants.
I've also read Why We Sleep before my sleep got this bad. In fact, knowing too much about how sleep work and the negative impact on health with lack of sleep makes it much worse for me. So now I tend to avoid reading articles like this and learning more details.
I guess what I'm asking is if there's anything more I can do, like something to supplement or eat/do to make up for the stuff lost due to insufficient sleep. It's a long shot asking in a tech forum, but I'm willing to give anything a chance to help improve my sleep. Let's hope there's more research into sleep as insomnia is one of the worst form of suffering.
>insomnia is one of the worst form of suffering
I once had a “day” that lasted four days or so. The last one was pretty hell on earth. Idk how people stay awake for weeks in stories out there. For a reader who never experienced that: it is not “I don’t wanna sleep and it’s probably bad”. No, you are tired as hell, your brain is almost failing, you want to sleep, but you just can not.
> you are tired as hell, your brain is almost failing, you want to sleep, but you just can not.
I know exactly what you mean. I was like that for the whole winter. Fortunately this scenario's not happened for quite some time. I'm at least getting some amount of sleep everyday.
It's possible that something is keeping you awake--a fear, an anxiety, a repressed emotion, loneliness, etc. If your mind perceives that resting would be risky for some reason, it won't--whether or not the risk is physically real, or imminent. There is a lot to be worried about in life, from immediate personal issues to global social and environmental concerns.
A therapist, psychologist, or psychiatrist may be able to help. I don't mean sleep therapy specifically, but general emotional and mental health.
PM: Magnesium (multiple forms), melatonin, l-theanine. AM: Vitamin D (from sun preferably) in the AM, moderate exercise 5 days/week
Diet: keto / low-carb
Also: Get checked for sleep apnea. Use Oura or a similar sleep tracker, preferably find a good one for SpO2 (Oura does not)
Good luck. Finding good sleep in modern society is hard.
I tend to exercise more, sleep more, feel better.
Baclofen and phenibut are similar GABA-B receptor agonists (phenibut also has a weak gabapentin effect), phenibut is more effective at usual doses (600-900 mg phenibut vs. 10mg baclofen), however the side effects are potentially worse in some ways (some people find it quite addictive and heavy use over a long period of time might cause retinal taurine depletion leading to permanant vision loss). However, baclofen has an increased chance of causing seizures, although I think the chance of this is low at 10mg (but phenibut can be started in higher doses while baclofen would need to be stepped up and down). Both have a chance of causing central apnea (as do a number of other medications). Some people don't find one or both helpful (I seem to have a fairly slow drug metabolism that might increase the effectiveness) and even if they do help they become much less effective if taken every day. I've tried various schedules and with baclofen 10mg every other day or possibly two days on and one day off seems to work the best. I've also done 10mg baclofen, 600mg phenibut, and a day off, although due to the issues with phenibut I would recommend just using baclofen. Balofen is prescription only and not commonly used for sleep (even sleep doctors might not know it can help), however there are a few studies using a daily higher dose that found it helped and that was enough for my doctor. I haven't seen any studies using the 10mg every other day. I did try 10mg every day for a month once and it still seemed to do something but it seemed quite a bit less effective. Overall, while not a great option in a lot of ways it has been helpful for me.
I'd recommend against seroquel, valproate, benzos or similar GABA-A receptor agonists, or any of the other more powerful antidepressants or antipsychotics. Some people find them helpful, but others have bad reactions that cause lasting damage. First-generation antihistamines might be better as a "get to sleep soon" drug, either diphenhydramine or, I've heard but haven't tried yet, ultra low dose doxepin (.5 to 4mg liquid form, works just as an antihistamine at that dose but has a longer half-life). Or a few other first-generation antihistamines that are harder to find these days that I haven't tried. However I don't think antihistamines are all that good for sleep maintenance issues.
Some people find delayed release melatonin helpful, however any form of melatonin just causes me to wake up early (this is not all that common so worth trying first if you haven't).
Ok, one other thing: I take 150mg sublingual uridine monophosphate mostly for circadian reasons but it does seem to make it a bit easier to cope with less sleep. The two possible side effects that I've heard of with uridine are digestive issues or there is concern that it might increase the chance or growth of cancer, although I think that seems unlikely to be the case at that dose and hasn't been reported in humans at any dose. I take at least a couple of days off every month or it looses effectiveness.
Actually a few more (that you might be doing already): keep the room as dark as possible when you sleep, ideally block all light. I also found an air purfier to be helpful due to the noise of the fan blocking irregular sounds. To limit circadian issues, try to get out of bed at the same time every day if possible (eventually it isn't if you don't get enough sleep).
I also have the "no rebound sleep" thing most of the time, although it has at least partly come back at times for a little while. I wonder if the loss of rebound sleep correlates with worse outcomes (I am also unable to work).
Really when I talk to a sleep doctor, they say don't stress about a single night or two of bad sleep. It happens. Even a weeklong stretch. If you can't sleep, don't try. And its ok if you get 5 or 6 hours. They'll often care about quality over quantity.
It is unfortunate that this research has to be done with animals and the scientific community is thankful to the society for understanding the crucial need for it and their support with research grants from their taxes.
But now, the discussion question: What would people say if this experimentation were being done on puppies, or rabbits, or baby seals? Why are fruit flies different?
Because we as a society explicitly assign different levels of moral worth to different animals. Fruit flies have greater worth than bacteria or yeast but lesser worth than mammals, which in turn have lesser worth than primates or humans (as subcategories of mammals).
That's an inherent problem to in vivo studies: we're fine with experiments on bacteria or yeast but we'd all be horrified at unconsenting experiment on humans. There's a line, and we must draw it somewhere.