Newsletter #047: Sleeping in on Weekends, Fasting, & Exercising During Commercial Breaks 💤
Hello Friends!
Welcome to the latest edition of the humanOS newsletter! Here is where we share our work, and the various studies and media that captured our attention this week. 🤓
This Week’s Research Highlights
💊 Acetyl-L-carnitine decreases depressive symptoms.
A meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials found that supplementation with acetyl-L-carnitine significantly reduced symptoms of depression. Furthermore, it showed similar effectiveness compared with established antidepressants in reducing depressive symptoms, but with reduced adverse effects. Our friend Adel Moussa wisely pointed out, on our Facebook page, that you might want to watch out for TMAO conversion in the gut and liver (though the extent to which you generate TMAO likely also depends on your diet and gut bugs).
🥱 Sleep loss ramps up hunger and increases the caloric intake.
A meta-analysis of 41 randomized controlled trials found that sleep restriction resulted in a significant increase in hunger and energy intake. Participants subjected to sleep restriction consumed on average 252.8 more calories per day, compared to normal sleep. Sleep restriction was also associated with weight gain, reduced insulin sensitivity, and alterations in brain activity in response to food stimuli.
🧎♀️ Regular brief interruptions to prolonged sitting (like exercising during commercial breaks) may improve glycemic control.
In a crossover trial, overweight adults completed two lab-based conditions: 3.5 hours of sitting and watching television, and 3.5 hours of watching television, punctuated by 3-minute bouts of light-intensity body-weight exercises occurring every twenty minutes (during commercial breaks). Compared to just sitting, plasma glucose iAUC was reduced by 33%, and plasma insulin iAUC was reduced by 41% in the group performing active commercial breaks. Might be worth a try if you’re spending a lot of time sitting in front of the TV enjoying March Madness. 🏀
🍲 Mistimed eating patterns may influence cancer risk.
Researchers performed a population-based case-control study, which included 621 cases of prostate and 1205 of breast cancer, compared to 872 male and 1321 female population controls who had never worked the night shift. Compared with subjects sleeping immediately after dinner, those sleeping two or more hours after dinner had a 20% reduction in cancer risk for breast & prostate cancer combined. A similar protection was observed in subjects who ate before 9 pm, compared to having dinner after 10 pm.
📱 Time spent on cell phones increasingly interferes with our sleep and our productivity.
Researchers in Australia surveyed 709 cell phone users in 2018, replicating a survey they conducted in 2005. 19% of women and 11.8% of men reported losing sleep due to the time they spend on their cell phones (vs 2.3% of women and 3.2% of men in 2005). 12.6% of men said that their productivity had decreased as a direct result of the time they spend on their phones – compared to 0% in 2005. 14% of women noticed deteriorating productivity (2.3% in 2005).
Podcasts We Loved This Week
- Charles Brenner: Nicotinamide riboside (NR) and the benefits of boosting NAD as we age. Via STEM-Talk.
- Tristan Bekinschtein & Leonard Mlodinow: Uncovering Consciousness. Via Naked Neuroscience.
Products We Are Enjoying
Better Than Bouillon (I use the vegetable base and the roasted garlic base).
Ginny says: Soups are a smart (and tasty) way to make sure you consume lots of vegetables. But they usually call for broth or stock, which can be sort of pricey if you’re using them frequently, and jugs of broth occupy a lot of space in the pantry. Yeah, I know, you can make stock yourself, but that’s...kind of a pain. Better Than Bouillon is an elegant solution to this problem. One 8-ounce jar of this concentrate contains about 38 servings, and the flavor is excellent - I can’t tell a difference. You can find it easily at most grocery stores, or you can of course order on Amazon.
New humanOS Content
- Blog: Should You Try to Pay off Sleep Debt on Weekends? By Greg Potter.
Every so often, we all will have a night where we don’t get as much sleep as we would like for optimal performance. But when sleep loss accumulates over multiple days, the negative effects associated with sleep restriction also grow, creating a state known as sleep debt. An all-too-common pattern, often observed in modern work culture, is to build up sleep debt over the week, and then try to “pay it off” on the weekend. But does this work?
A recent study, conducted by Ken Wright and colleagues, explored the effects of this kind of weekend recovery sleep. They specifically examined how catching up on sleep on the weekend affected food intake and insulin sensitivity. The findings suggest that paying off sleep debt on the weekend may not work quite as we would like, and may even be somewhat counterproductive.
So, what should we make of this? 🤔 In this blog, Greg examines the scientists’ results and puts their fascinating study into proper context. Check it out to learn more!