Sleep helps in weight loss

Numerous studies have shown that insufficient sleep affects the metabolism of our body resulting in increased body weight. Specifically, the short sleep duration (less than 6 hours) and excessive sleep (more than 8 hours) can increase your weight gradually and lead to obesity. Many factors contribute to how sleep affects your weight.

How does inadequate sleep affect our body?

- It interferes with the metabolism of carbohydrates increasing levels of blood sugar and insulin levels, which results in storage of body fat
- It reduces levels of leptin, causing increased appetite for sweets
- It reduces the levels of growth hormone which regulates the proportion of fat and muscle mass in the body
- It can lead to inoulinoresistance contributing to type 2 diabetes
- Can raise blood pressure
- May increase the risk for cardiovascular disease
- Reduces the immune system
- Increasing levels of stress in our bodies.

Even in young, healthy people, lack of sleep by 3-4 hours a week has significant effect on the body.

What is the best time to sleep?

The best times to go to sleep and wake up rested is between 9-12pm for ages 18-45 years. If you sleep after 12, even with adequate sleep you may not have achieved the maximum relaxation. This is because everyone has a biological clock that regulates various functions of the body, even during sleep hours.

Specifically, from 11 pm until 3am the blood circulation is mainly concentrated in the liver where the process of detoxification of the body takes place. So when you do not sleep during these hours the process of detoxification is limited. Eg. If you sleep at 11pm There are 4 full hours for detoxification of our body, and if you sleep at 2 am we only have 1 hour! So, if you sleep after 3 a.m. then our body does not detoxify thereby releasing toxins known to have adverse effects on our health.

So the key to proper weight loss is to "eat less, move more and sleep well ...!"

One gene makes you sleep ... less

For some, the many hours of sleep is a luxury for others a need. A gene that reduces our need to sleep explains why some people work well shutting their eyes for just 4 hours every 24 hours when others need from 8 to 12 hours sleep each night to function. The gene was named ABCC9 and earlier studies have demonstrated correlation with heart disease and diabetes.

The Great Napoleon and the former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher are known for their few needs to sleep.

The study, whose findings are published in the online edition of inspection «Molecular Psychiatry», involving 4,000 volunteers from seven European countries, who completed a questionnaire evaluating sleep habits and underwent analysis of their genetic material. Those of them had two copies of a typical mutation ABCC9, slept much less than what those who had two copies of one another mutation.

"The gene is evolutionarily ancient ABCC9, since there is in drosophila," said chief researcher Dr. Carla Alemprant, Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich.

According to the researchers, the gene encoding the protein ABCC9 SUR2, which forms part of the regulatory potassium channel in the cell membrane. These channels act as sensors for energy metabolism in cells.

These findings, in combination, "suggest that the association of sleep duration with disorders of the metabolic syndrome may be partly explained by this common molecular mechanism," she added.