Circadian Rhythm Quotes

Five hours' New York jet lag and Cayce Pollard wakes in Camden Town to the dire and ever-circling wolves of disrupted circadian rhythm.

Lithium tweaks many mood-altering chemicals in the brain, and its effects are complicated. Most interesting, lithium seems to reset the body’s circadian rhythm, its inner clock. In normal people, ambient conditions, especially the sun, dictate their humors and determine when they are tuckered out for the day. They’re on a twenty-four-hour cycle. Bipolar people run on cycles independent of the sun. And run and run.

When sleep puts an end to delirium, it is a good symptom.

A disruption of the circadian cycle—the metabolic and glandular rhythms that are central to our workaday life—seems to be involved in many, if not most, cases of depression; this is why brutal insomnia so often occurs and is most likely why each day’s pattern of distress exhibits fairly predictable alternating periods of intensity and relief.

The 114 chakras exhibits quantum coherence., through which the body maintains balance endocrine hormone secretion, circadian rhythms and optimal mind-body connections. The decoherence is associated with diseases.

By the time that same individual has reached sixteen years of age, their circadian rhythm has undergone a dramatic shift forward in its cycling phase.

Time and tide. Love had its own circadian rhythms, and it was beginning to look like he and Max had missed their chance, that they'd slipped into a comfortable somnolence. Perhaps they would continue on indefinitely, but it was all too likely one of these days they were simply going to drift gently, quietly apart.

Each of us has a “chronotype”—a personal pattern of circadian rhythms that influences our physiology and psychology.

I lost my circadian rhythm during extreme night shift work and I restored it by using continuous light therapy. I was waking up at sunrise with the birds, no alarm clock needed.

sit vigil in a world with no circadian rhythm.

Certain times of day are especially conducive to focused creativity, thanks to circadian rhythms of arousal and mental alertness. Notice when you seem to have the most energy during the day, and dedicate those valuable periods to your most important creative work. Never book a meeting during this time if you can help it. And don’t waste any of it on administrative work!

asking your teenage son or daughter to go to bed and fall asleep at ten p.m. is the circadian equivalent of asking you, their parent, to go to sleep at seven or eight p.m. No matter how loud you enunciate the order, no matter how much that teenager truly wishes to obey your instruction, and no matter what amount of willed effort is applied by either of the two parties, the circadian rhythm of a teenager will not be miraculously coaxed into a change. Furthermore, asking that same teenager to wake up at seven the next morning and function with intellect, grace, and good mood is the equivalent of asking you, their parent, to do the same at four or five a.m.

cardiovascular functions are influenced by circadian rhythms, and as a result, heart attacks are much more common in the morning hours.

This was jet lag, she told herself. The discombobulation, the separation of mind and body, the struggle of each to reclaim the other and together resume circadian rhythms.

Our modern lifestyle, in which we spend most of our time indoors looking at bright screens and turn on bright lights at night, activates melanopsin at the wrong times of day and night, which then disrupts our circadian rhythms and reduces the production of the sleep hormone melatonin; as a result, we cannot get restorative sleep. When we wake up the next day and spend most of the day indoors, the dim indoor light cannot fully activate melanopsin, which means that we cannot align our circadian clock to the day-night cycle, making us feel sleepy and less alert. After a few days or weeks, we get into depression and anxiety.

Jet lag results from our rapid motion between time zones, across the lines that we have drawn on the earth that equate light with time, and time with geography. Yet our sense of place is scrambled as easily as our body’s circadian rhythms. Because jet lag refers only to a confusion of time, to a difference measured by hours, I call this other feeling ‘place lag’: the imaginative drag that results from our jet-age displacements over every kind of distance; from the inability of our deep old sense of place to keep up with our aeroplanes.

When I went to the medical profession complaining of fatigue and forgetfulness, they diagnosed me with Mental Illness, Sleep Apnea and Small Airways Disease. What I actually had was far larger and included Altitude Hypersensitivity, Circadian Rhythm Disorder and Urea Cycle Disorder, and all of them cause fatigue and forgetfulness!

Chickens—lowly chickens!—have a rhodopsin for low-light conditions, four color-sensing pigments, and a pigment in their pineal glands (uninventively called pinopsin) that uses light to help set their circadian rhythm. That’s quite a bit of color, but chickens aren’t so lowly, really. They’re the evolutionary offspring of dinosaurs, after all.

I am powered by moonlight!

A number of prominent epidemiological studies have reported that nighttime shift work, and the disruption to circadian rhythms and sleep that it causes, up your odds of developing numerous different forms of cancer considerably. To date, these include associations with cancer of the breast, cancer of the prostate, cancer of the uterus wall or the endometrium, and cancer of the colon.

In fact, setting a constant wake time is one of the most powerful tools at our disposal when looking to improve the quality of our recovery. Our bodies love it, with our circadian rhythms, set by the rise and fall of the sun, working around a consistent point, and our minds love it, because through this constant wake time we can build the confidence to be more flexible in other aspects of our lives.

It is for such reasons that I always ask my clinical clients first about sleep. Do they wake up in the morning at approximately the time the typical person wakes up, and at the same time every day? If the answer is no, fixing that is the first thing I recommend. It doesn’t matter so much if they go to bed at the same time each evening, but waking up at a consistent hour is a necessity. Anxiety and depression cannot be easily treated if the sufferer has unpredictable daily routines. The systems that mediate negative emotion are tightly tied to the properly cyclical circadian rhythms. The next thing I ask about is breakfast. I counsel my clients to eat a fat and protein-heavy breakfast as soon as possible after they awaken (no simple carbohydrates, no sugars, as they are digested too rapidly, and produce a blood-sugar spike and rapid dip). This is because anxious and depressed people are already stressed, particularly if their lives have not been under control for a good while. Their bodies are therefore primed to hypersecrete insulin, if they engage in any complex or demanding activity. If they do so after fasting all night and before eating, the excess insulin in their bloodstream will mop up all their blood sugar. Then they become hypoglycemic and psych​ophys​iologi​cally unstable.

At the root of this myth, invented around primeval campfires, lies your heliophilia, by which I mean love of warmth; the circadian rhythm, which relies upon diurnal activity. For you the night is cold, dark, sinister, menacing, and full of danger. The sunrise, however, represents another victory in the fight for life, a new day, the continuation of existence. Sunlight carries with it light and the sun; and the sun’s rays, which are invigorating for you, bring with them the destruction of hostile monsters.

Neurotransmitters are chemical-like substances that travel between nerve cells across a synapse and determine whether a nerve signal keeps going or halts. Levels of two of these neurotransmitters, dopamine and serotonin, decrease during adolescence. The decrease in dopamine results in mood changes and problems with emotional control. The decrease in serotonin results in decreased impulse control. A third neurotransmitter, melatonin, increases in adolescence. Melatonin is responsible for circadian rhythms and the sleep–wake cycle. Its increase results in a need for greater sleep.

All living things respond to the same 24-hour rhythm, in tandem with the Earth’s rotation. Halberg coined the terms “chronobiology”—the influence of time and certain periodic cycles on biological function—and “circadian” (from Latin circa = about; and dies = day) for daily biological rhythms. He created the Chronobiology Laboratories at the University of Minnesota and became known

Here’s what’s uniquely insidious about caffeine: the drug is not only a leading cause of our sleep deprivation; it is also the principal tool we rely on to remedy the problem. Most of the caffeine consumed today is being used to compensate for the lousy sleep that caffeine causes. Which means that caffeine is helping to hide from our awareness the very problem that caffeine creates. Charles Czeisler, an expert on sleep and circadian rhythms at Harvard Medical School, put the matter starkly several years ago in a National Geographic article by T. R. Reid: The principal reason that caffeine is used around the world is to promote wakefulness. But the principal reason that people need that crutch is inadequate sleep. Think about that: We use caffeine to make up for a sleep deficit that is largely the result of using caffeine.

Sitting here in my lab, I can imagine you scratching your head again: Dr. Panda, what’s the big deal? Aren’t we talking about just a few ounces of fat gain after a late-night snack? Won’t my metabolic rhythm come back the next day? Actually, it’s worse than you think. It is hard enough for the body to monitor hormones, genes, and clocks for someone with a strict eating routine. But when eating occurs at random times throughout the day and night, the fat-making process stays on all the time. At the same time, glucose created from digested carbohydrates floods our blood and the liver becomes inefficient in its ability to absorb glucose. If this continues for a few days, blood glucose continues to rise and reaches the danger zone of prediabetes or diabetes. So, if you’ve wondered why diets haven’t worked for you before, timing might be the reason. Even if you were diligently exercising; counting calories; avoiding fats, carbs, and sweets; and piling on the protein, it’s quite likely that you weren’t respecting your circadian clocks. If you eat late at night or start breakfast at a wildly different time each morning, you are constantly throwing your body out of sync. Don’t worry, the fix is equally simple: Just set an eating routine and stick to it. Timing is everything.

Circadian rhythms are implicated in some of the symptoms of depression, such as early awakening and diurnal variation in mood. The possible importance of the circadian system in its pathogenesis is suggested by the capacity of experimental alterations in the timing of sleep and wakefulness to alter clinical state." Biological rhythms range in frequency from milliseconds to months or years. Most rhythmic disturbances identified in the symptoms of manic-depressive illness occur over the course of a day-that is, they are circadian rhythms-and are most apparent in the daily rest-activity cycle. The episodic recurrences of the illness, on the other hand, are usually infradian, oscillating over periods of months or years. Episodic mania and depression may also reflect disturbances in ultradian rhythms, those that oscillate more than once a day, which are common at the cellular level and in hormone secretion, as well as in such autonomic functions as circulation, blood pressure, respiration, heart rate, and in the cycles of sleep.

A flower clock?" "Yeah. Mum was... is a florist, so I'm using her books on flowers to try to re-create or, well, create Carl Linnaeus's flower clock. He was a guy from the eighteenth century. Basically, each flower in the clock opens at a different time of day." "Its petals open?" "Yeah, so flowers have circadian rhythms," Ben says. He's blushing. "I don't know. Sounds stupid now I'm saying it. And it hasn't actually worked yet either. I thought, though, that with climate change and everything, the flowers will start opening at weird times, so it kind of goes beyond everything with, you know... my mum. It'll be, like, the more we damage the world, the more we damage the clock, and time, and, yeah, the future." "That sounds beautiful, Ben," I say. "Yeah, I don't know. I mean, what am I going to do with it? What's the point of it, really? Will it go in a gallery and then be, like, sold as prints of photographs of it or something? And then the time element of it will be gone." "Hmm." "Sorry," Ben says, and he shakes his head. "I guess I'm in a bit of a crap mood." He looks at me sideways, and nervously laughs to himself. "I mean, I don't know why I just told you all that." I shake my head. "It's fine. So, what flower's time is it now?" I ask. Ben looks at his phone. "Ugh, yeah, so that's the other thing. There actually doesn't seem to be a flower for each hour, which is kind of problematic. But the closest to now is the meadow goat's beard. It opens at three." "Oh, cool," I say. "So right now doesn't exist in flower time?" "Yeah, I guess it doesn't. I've never thought of it like that.

As a nine-year-old, the circadian rhythm would have the child asleep by around nine p.m., driven in part by the rising tide of melatonin at this time in children. By the time that same individual has reached sixteen years of age, their circadian rhythm has undergone a dramatic shift forward in its cycling phase. The rising tide of melatonin, and the instruction of darkness and sleep, is many hours away. As a consequence, the sixteen-year-old will usually have no interest in sleeping at nine p.m. Instead, peak wakefulness is usually still in play at that hour. By the time the parents are getting tired, as their circadian rhythms take a downturn and melatonin release instructs sleep—perhaps around ten or eleven p.m., their teenager can still be wide awake. A few more hours must pass before the circadian rhythm of a teenage brain begins to shut down alertness and allow for easy, sound sleep to begin. This, of course, leads to much angst and frustration for all parties involved on the back end of sleep. Parents want their teenager to be awake at a “reasonable” hour of the morning. Teenagers, on the other hand, having only been capable of initiating sleep some hours after their parents, can still be in their trough of the circadian downswing. Like an animal prematurely wrenched out of hibernation too early, the adolescent brain still needs more sleep and more time to complete the circadian cycle before it can operate efficiently, without grogginess. If this remains perplexing to parents, a different way to frame and perhaps appreciate the mismatch is this: asking your teenage son or daughter to go to bed and fall asleep at ten p.m. is the circadian equivalent of asking you, their parent, to go to sleep at seven or eight p.m. No matter how loud you enunciate the order, no matter how much that teenager truly wishes to obey your instruction, and no matter what amount of willed effort is applied by either of the two parties, the circadian rhythm of a teenager will not be miraculously coaxed into a change. Furthermore, asking that same teenager to wake up at seven the next morning and function with intellect, grace, and good mood is the equivalent of asking you, their parent, to do the same at four or five a.m. Sadly, neither society nor our parental attitudes are well designed to appreciate or accept that teenagers need more sleep than adults, and that they are biologically wired to obtain that sleep at a different time from their parents. It’s very understandable for parents to feel frustrated in this way, since they believe that their teenager’s sleep patterns reflect a conscious choice and not a biological edict. But non-volitional, non-negotiable, and strongly biological they are. We parents would be wise to accept this fact, and to embrace it, encourage it, and praise it, lest we wish our own children to suffer developmental brain abnormalities or force a raised risk of mental illness upon them.

We tend to be unaware that stars rise and set at all. This is not entirely due to our living in cities ablaze with electric lights which reflect back at us from our fumes, smoke, and artificial haze. When I discussed the stars with a well-known naturalist, I was surprised to learn that even a man such as he, who has spent his entire lifetime observing wildlife and nature, was totally unaware of the movements of the stars. And he is no prisoner of smog-bound cities. He had no inkling, for instance, that the Little Bear could serve as a reliable night clock as it revolves in tight circles around the Pole Star (and acts as a celestial hour-hand at half speed - that is, it takes 24 hours rather than 12 for a single revolution). I wondered what could be wrong. Our modern civilization does not ignore the stars only because most of us can no longer see them. There are definitely deeper reasons. For even if we leave the sulphurous vapours of our Gomorrahs to venture into a natural landscape, the stars do not enter into any of our back-to-nature schemes. They simply have no place in our outlook any more. We look at them, our heads flung back in awe and wonder that they can exist in such profusion. But that is as far as it goes, except for the poets. This is simply a 'gee whiz' reaction. The rise in interest in astrology today does not result in much actual star-gazing. And as for the space programme's impact on our view of the sky, many people will attentively follow the motions of a visible satellite against a backdrop of stars whose positions are absolutely meaningless to them. The ancient mythological figures sketched in the sky were taught us as children to be quaint 'shepherds' fantasies' unworthy of the attention of adult minds. We are interested in the satellite because we made it, but the stars are alien and untouched by human hands - therefore vapid. To such a level has our technological mania, like a bacterial solution in which we have been stewed from birth, reduced us. It is only the integral part of the landscape which can relate to the stars. Man has ceased to be that. He inhabits a world which is more and more his own fantasy. Farmers relate to the skies, as well as sailors, camel caravans, and aerial navigators. For theirs are all integral functions involving the fundamental principle - now all but forgotten - of orientation. But in an almost totally secular and artificial world, orientation is thought to be un- necessary. And the numbers of people in insane asylums or living at home doped on tranquilizers testifies to our aimless, drifting metaphysic. And to our having forgotten orientation either to seasons (except to turn on the air- conditioning if we sweat or the heating system if we shiver) or to direction (our one token acceptance of cosmic direction being the wearing of sun-glasses because the sun is 'over there'). We have debased what was once the integral nature of life channelled by cosmic orientations - a wholeness - to the ennervated tepidity of skin sensations and retinal discomfort. Our interior body clocks, known as circadian rhythms, continue to operate inside us, but find no contact with the outside world. They therefore become ingrown and frustrated cycles which never interlock with our environment. We are causing ourselves to become meaningless body machines programmed to what looks, in its isolation, to be an arbitrary set of cycles. But by tearing ourselves from our context, like the still-beating heart ripped out of the body of an Aztec victim, we inevitably do violence to our psyches. I would call the new disease, with its side effect of 'alienation of the young', dementia temporalis.

One of the primary reasons that the OMAD Diet works while other diets fail is that most diets don’t address the root cause of weight gain, which is a disrupted circadian rhythm, termed chronodisruption. Disruption of the circadian rhythm leads to weight gain and a multitude of health problems, such as diabetes and heart disease.

All overweight and obese people have a disrupted circadian rhythm leading to weight gain and a multitude of health problems, such as diabetes and heart disease. The weight and health of the body depend largely on how well the circadian clock is working.

The Kapha Season Kapha season is like springtime for your body. For the first twenty years, your body builds bones and tissues, and the circadian rhythm fluctuates wildly at times, trying to find a balance. Babies aren’t born with a set sleep schedule, but they develop one quickly during the first months of life. Gradually, the body settles into a system in which the hormones, blood pressure, bowels, and other systems function on a diurnal schedule. Anyone with teenagers knows that they give up their regular sleep habits and become night owls. They are impossible to pry out of bed in the morning and sleep until noon on weekends. In fact, some researchers suggest that the real end of adolescence can be marked by the time when young adults give up trying to stay up so late. Teenagers’ eating schedules, too, become erratic as they crave energy while their bodies are growing and maturing. When they get out of balance, teens can struggle in school and get inflammatory conditions, such as acne. They can adopt dietary habits that will be harder to shake as they become adults, which can lead to weight gain and depression in adulthood. This is a crucial time to introduce kids to healthy eating, a good night’s sleep, and plenty of exercise. Their growing bodies demand a lot of fuel, and their muscles need to move in order to develop properly. I often see patients who are still in their teen years struggling with school, friendships, and finding a sense of purpose. Though it may sound surprising, I can often trace these problems back to an unhealthy schedule, including late nights of doing homework (or texting while pretending to do homework), and eating unhealthy foods late in the day. Another culprit is little or no exercise, and a lack of natural light. Kids need natural light during these critical growing years.

For men, the “boner or no boner” test is a simple but excellent indicator of sleep quality, hormonal health (GH, FSH, testosterone), circadian rhythm timing, and more.

The best low-priced device currently on the market for this purpose can be found on my recommended products page under “Circadian Rhythm Reset.” There are other higher-priced devices you can find on Amazon which work great as well if you fancy a different look.

For newcomers from slow cultures, time is a river that flows through their lives. They have no abstract sense of time. Refugees who have been on sun, seasonal, or Circadian-rhythm time find the change to computer time jarring. One of the first things I teach new arrivals is time management, a very difficult skill to master but one that is essential to success in America. I bring calendars, personal planners, and watches and teach refugees how to make and keep appointments.

begin. This, of course, leads to much angst and frustration for all parties involved on the back end of sleep. Parents want their teenager to be awake at a “reasonable” hour of the morning. Teenagers, on the other hand, having only been capable of initiating sleep some hours after their parents, can still be in their trough of the circadian downswing. Like an animal prematurely wrenched out of hibernation too early, the adolescent brain still needs more sleep and more time to complete the circadian cycle before it can operate efficiently, without grogginess. If this remains perplexing to parents, a different way to frame and perhaps appreciate the mismatch is this: asking your teenage son or daughter to go to bed and fall asleep at ten p.m. is the circadian equivalent of asking you, their parent, to go to sleep at seven or eight p.m. No matter how loud you enunciate the order, no matter how much that teenager truly wishes to obey your instruction, and no matter what amount of willed effort is applied by either of the two parties, the circadian rhythm of a teenager will not be miraculously coaxed into a change.

What to remove? Dairy. From cows, goats, and sheep (including butter). Grains. For the more intensive version of this 30-day diet, eliminate all grains. This is important for those with digestive or autoimmune conditions. If this feels undoable for a full month, add in a small serving a day of gluten-free grains like white rice or quinoa. If that still feels undoable, consider a whole-foods diet rich in vegetables that is strictly gluten- and dairy-free. Legumes. Beans of all kinds (soy, black, kidney, pinto, etc.), lentils, and peanuts. Green peas and snap peas are okay. Sweeteners, real or artificial. Sugar, high-fructose corn syrup, maple syrup, honey, agave, Splenda, Equal, NutraSweet, xylitol, stevia, etc. Processed or refined snack foods. Sodas and diet sodas. Alcohol in any form. White potatoes. Premade sauces and seasonings. How to avoid common pitfalls: Prepare well beforehand. Choose a time frame during which you will have limited or reduced travel, and that doesn’t include holidays or special occasions. Study the list of foods allowed on the diet and make a shopping list. Remove the foods from your pantry or refrigerator that aren’t allowed on the diet, if that makes it easier. Engage the whole family to try this together, or find a friend to join you. Success happens in community. Set up a calendar to mark your progress. Print out a free 30-day online calendar, tape it to the refrigerator door, and mark off each day. Pack snacks with you, pack your lunch, call ahead to restaurants to check their menu (or check online). Get enough vegetables and fats. If you feel jittery or lose too much weight, increase your carbohydrates (starchy vegetables like yams, taro, sweet potatoes). Don’t misread withdrawal-type symptoms as the diet “not working.” These symptoms usually resolve within a week’s time. Personalize it. Start with the basics above and: * If you’re having trouble with autoimmune conditions, eliminate eggs, too. * If you’re prone to weight gain, eat less meat and heavier foods (ex: stews, chili), more vegetables and raw foods. * If you’re prone to weight loss or having trouble gaining weight, eat more meats and heavier foods (ex: stews, chili), less raw foods like salads. * If you’re generally healthy and wanting a boost in energy, try short-term fasts of 12–16 hours. Due to the circadian rhythm of the digestive tract, skipping dinner is best (as opposed to skipping breakfast). Try this 1–2 times a week. (This fast also means no supplements or beverages other than tea or water during the fasting time.)

Your Dopamine System with Quality Sleep. The dopamine system helps modulate both slow-wave sleep and REM sleep.28 Furthermore, not only does dopamine have a large effect on sleep (as well as on pain and depression) but sleep, pain, and depression all also affect the dopamine system. In addition, many aspects of the dopamine system are influenced by circadian rhythms, including the production of dopamine receptors, dopamine transporters, and dopamine itself.

However, by eleven p.m. it’s a very different situation, as illustrated in figure 6. You’ve now been awake for fifteen hours and your brain is drenched in high concentrations of adenosine (note how the solid line in the figure has risen sharply). In addition, the dotted line of the circadian rhythm is descending, powering down your activity and alertness levels. As a result, the difference between the two lines has grown large, reflected in the long vertical double arrow in figure 6. This powerful combination of abundant adenosine (high sleep pressure) and declining circadian rhythm (lowered activity levels) triggers a strong desire for sleep. Figure 6: The Urge to Sleep

... we no longer wake up with the dawn chorus and settle down for the night with the hum of crickets. But just as our circadian rhythms are affected by exposure to natural light, sounds can act as cues for our sense of time and how we feel. ... There are alarm clocks that can help with your acoustic circadian rhythms by playing birdsong to wake you and the sound of waves lapping as you go to sleep... try creating your own soundtrack for the day.

It is thought that a lack of sunlight stops the hypothalamus (a small part of the brain that regulates important functions, including circadian rhythms) from working properly, which leads to a lack of serotonin (the "happy hormone") and a disrupted body clock.

More than 80 percent of public high schools in the United States begin before 8:15 a.m. Almost 50 percent of those start before 7:20 a.m. School buses for a 7:20 a.m. start time usually begin picking up kids at around 5:45 a.m. As a result, some children and teenagers must wake up at 5:30 a.m., 5:15 a.m., or even earlier, and do so five days out of every seven, for years on end. This is lunacy. Could you concentrate and learn much of anything when you had woken up so early? Keep in mind that 5:15 a.m. to a teenager is not the same as 5:15 a.m. to an adult. Previously, we noted that the circadian rhythm of teenagers shifts forward dramatically by one to three hours. So really the question I should ask you, if you are an adult, is this: Could you concentrate and learn anything after having forcefully been woken up at 3:15 a.m., day after day after day? Would you be in a cheerful mood? Would you find it easy to get along with your coworkers and conduct yourself with grace, tolerance, respect, and a pleasant demeanor? Of course not. Why, then, do we ask this of the millions of teenagers and children in industrialized nations?

Night shift work is known to cause shift work disorders.

Night shift work causes circadian rhythm disruption that can lead to depression, chronic fatigue and hormonal imbalances.

Night shift work is a known trigger of depression symptoms.

My health issues are now fully understood, treated and I am back to normal. It was a mix of amino acid deficiencies and low testosterone causing serious food intolerance and altitude hypersensitivity to occur. Low magnesium was causing sleep apnea and I now take magnesium supplements. I had also lost my circadian rhythm and it restored while I was homeless and camping outdoors for five months in the Hawaiian jungle. Based on my testing, I will have to take amino acids, magnesium and testosterone for the rest of my life. The sickness comes back if I stop the supplements.

Nutrient-dense real food; optimal levels of nutrients, vitamins, minerals, and phytonutrients; the right balance of hormones; the right types of exercise; optimal quality and duration of sleep; deep, restorative practices like meditation or breath work; the right light at the right times, honoring our circadian rhythms; clean water and air; the right mindset and mastering our mind’s negative inner dialogue, which registers in every cell in our body; meaning and purpose; community and connection and love. These are the fundamental building blocks of human health, most of which we as a culture do not prioritize.

Note: Dr. Lawrence Polinkis who analyzed clinical data from American men and women at Antarctica's Mcmurdo station Amundsen Scott's South Pole station posits specifically that the memory loss and other cognitive impairments he observed were related to a decline in levels of the thyroid hormone T3, which helps determine how the body uses energy. Thyroid hormones help the body regulate temperature and set its circadian rhythms. It's not difficult to see how extreme cold and the prolonged absence of sunshine might throw a system off. This is just a hypothesis - the causes of the syndrome remain puzzling more the a century after Cook first described it.

All the research I had read on sleeping in moonlight said I would turn into a lunatic, so it was surprising when it resulted in feeling healthier!

The research that states humans that sleep in moonlight will turn into lunatics appears to be flawed.

they took a trip into Mammoth Cave in Kentucky, one of the deepest caverns on the planet—so deep, in fact, that no detectable sunlight penetrates its farthest reaches. It was from this darkness that Kleitman and Richardson were to illuminate a striking scientific finding that would define our biological rhythm as being approximately one day (circadian), and not precisely one day.

Just as artificial illumination has freed us from the light-dark cycle, it has also opened the door to night shift work, which upsets the body's circadian rhythm. Electricity powers evening routines that conspire against rest.

HYPOTHALAMUS These cells are linked to the retina of our eyes and appear to regulate cycles of hormone secretion, our skin temperature and cycles of rest and wakefulness. The hormone melatonin is thought to play a significant role in controlling our daily (circadian) rhythm.

When you are waiting for someone to die, time is unrecognizable. Hours bleed into days; days are suddenly weeks. You might go several days without realizing you have not showered; you forget to eat. You sleep and worry and sit vigil in a world with no circadian rhythm.

These conditions commonly coexist with ADHD: Obstructive sleep apnea: This sleep disorder, characterized by snoring and pauses in breathing during sleep, is more common among adults, but it does occur in children, especially children with ADHD. Restless leg syndrome: This condition causes an intense, often irresistible urge to move your legs, particularly when sitting or lying down. Unlike ADHD-related hyperactivity, it happens mostly at night and often gets worse with age. Periodic limb movement syndrome: You know how your leg kicks or your arm flops all of a sudden when you’re falling asleep? It has a name. At least, it does when it keeps happening every twenty to forty seconds and long enough to interfere with sleep.[*3] Sleepwalking and night terrors: These sleep disorders occur when the lines between awake and asleep are blurred. They are often first observed in childhood by parents. Insomnia: You’ve probably heard of this one. Insomnia occurs whenever you want to sleep but can’t sleep, due to difficulties falling asleep or staying asleep, and it is also one of the criteria for delayed sleep phase syndrome. Delayed sleep phase syndrome: This syndrome occurs when your body’s internal clock, or its circadian rhythm, is delayed by two or more hours. For example, you might naturally want to sleep from three a.m. to noon. Excessive daytime sleepiness: This condition is exactly what it sounds like. If you’re falling asleep in the middle of a movie at your friend’s house or missing a shift because you can’t stay awake, it doesn’t mean you’re a bad friend or a lazy employee. It could be a sign that something is wrong.

I was born in Ibiza. My circadian rhythms are negotiable.

circadian rhythm

Bad circadian rhythm. Leptin may get out of balance when you disrupt your delicate but incredibly important circadian rhythm by becoming addicted to caffeine, alcohol, or sugar. Eliminating these substances allows your body to get back to its natural rhythm.

Cell differentiation can turn neurons into everything from clocks that control circadian rhythms to photoreceptors that convert light into electrical-chemical impulses or decision makers that tally votes and decide courses of action. In the retina (often used as a case study because it can be directly and naturally stimulated), there are at least fifty different kinds of neurons specialized to different tasks, such as looking for motion, recognizing colors, detecting objects in low light, and measuring brightness and contrast. In the brain as a whole, there may be as many as 10,000 different kinds of neurons, each contributing to a different aspect of mental life.

psychological constructs fall under five broad functional domains or systems: negative valence systems (e.g., threat processing), positive valence systems (reward processing), cognitive systems (e.g., attention, perception, memory, working memory, executive function), arousal and regulatory systems (e.g., brain arousal, circadian rhythm, motivation), and social processing systems (e.g., attachment, separation).

She was drowning, pulled under by a froth of limbs and bodies, swept along by currents of voices, music, and car engines. Dark shadows circled her like hungry sharks. She rose up, dragged to the surface by an impatient crowd. Hands and elbows pushed and shoved. Exhaust fumes and food smells clogged her nostrils. This was the old part of the city, where archaic buildings stood side by side, defences pitched against the onslaught of the modern. There were no smooth walls here, no towers made of steel and glass. This was all shadows and sculpture, buttresses and winding alleys; the impenetrable heart of a long ago city, beating to a circadian rhythm. The

15.   Baby is not being exposed to adequate amounts of daylight. Explanation/Recommendation: Natural light is important to help babies regulate their circadian clock. This is the inner clock, the biological time-keeping system that regulates daily activities, such as sleep and wake cycles. We recommend that, as soon as your baby awakens in the morning, you take him to a room filled with daylight (although he does not need to be in direct sunlight). Natural light, along with the first feeding of the day, will help establish his circadian rhythm and keep them consistent. Routine helps facilitate this amazing function possessed by all humans.

those doing intense physical activity, 10 hours is not too much. •The best way to figure out the right amount of sleep for you is to spend 10 to 14 days going to sleep when you are tired and waking up without an alarm clock. Take the average sleep time. That’s what you need. •For a better night’s sleep, follow these tips, consolidated from the world’s leading researchers: Ensure you expose yourself to natural (i.e., non-electric) light throughout the day. This will help you maintain a healthy circadian rhythm. Exercise. Vigorous physical activity makes us tired. When we are tired, we sleep. But don’t exercise too close to bedtime. Limit caffeine intake, and phase it out completely 5 to 6 hours prior to your bedtime. Only use your bed for sleep and sex. Not for eating, watching television, working on your laptop, or anything else. The one exception is reading a paper book prior to bed. Don’t drink alcohol close to bedtime. Although alcohol can hasten the onset of sleep, it often

Ideally, in a person who is adjusted to the local time zone, the body’s circadian rhythms behave as follows: •​Melatonin secretion peaks at night and decreases throughout the day. •​Cortisol levels peak in the morning and decrease throughout the day. •​Core body temperature reaches its lowest peak in the middle of the night and rises throughout the day. •​Clock genes promote activity in the daytime and recovery during the night. In a jet-lagged body, these rhythms get mixed up because the external environment has changed and the internal rhythms haven’t had a chance to catch up. Rises in core temperature at night will cause premature wakening; melatonin secretion throughout the day will cause daytime sleepiness, and, as we know, lack of sleep is responsible for a large handful of common jet-lag symptoms.

LIFE FORMULAS I (2008) These are notes to myself. Your frame of reference, and therefore your calculations, may vary. These are not definitions—these are algorithms for success. Contributions are welcome. → Happiness = Health + Wealth + Good Relationships → Health = Exercise + Diet + Sleep → Exercise = High Intensity Resistance Training + Sports + Rest → Diet = Natural Foods + Intermittent Fasting + Plants → Sleep = No alarms + 8–9 hours + Circadian rhythms → Wealth = Income + Wealth * (Return on Investment) → Income = Accountability + Leverage + Specific Knowledge → Accountability = Personal Branding + Personal Platform + Taking Risk? → Leverage = Capital + People + Intellectual Property → Specific Knowledge = Knowing how to do something society cannot yet easily train other people to do → Return on Investment = “Buy-and-Hold” + Valuation + Margin of Safety [72]

Mednick discovered that you can use knowledge of the relationship between sleep pressure, circadian rhythm, and sleep type to tailor a nap to your needs. About six hours after you wake up, your body’s circadian rhythm starts to dip and you’re likely to feel drowsy, especially if you’ve had a busy morning and lunch. A twenty-minute power nap at this point (say at 1:00 p.m.) is enough to give you a mental recharge without leaving you groggy: if you keep it short, you’ll wake up fairly alert and can quickly get back to work. If you stretch it out to an hour, the balance between your circadian rhythm and sleep pressure will produce a nap that balances REM and short-wave sleep. If, on the other hand, you take a nap an hour earlier, five hours after waking, the balance will be different: more REM sleep, less slow-wave sleep. This kind of nap will deliver a little creative nudge: you’re likely to dream and more likely to enroll your subconscious in whatever you were recently working on. If you wait until an hour later, seven hours after waking, your body needs more rest, and an hour-long nap will be richer in slow-wave sleep and more physically restorative than creatively stimulating.

C’mon, they said it about radio and the telephone and TV.” Yeah, it sounds like that argument might be right—but it’s not. Not if you think about it for more than two seconds. I don’t remember lugging a TV under my covers so I could watch Huckleberry Hound until the screen asked me “Are you still watching?” I looked forward to seeing I Dream of Jeannie once a week, but it didn’t throw off my circadian rhythm. I liked McHale’s Navy, but I wasn’t addicted to it; I didn’t watch it when I drove. Radio to TV was a difference in degree; smartphones are a difference in kind—less like TV or radio and more like a pacemaker. Something you can’t live without.

Life Formulas I (2008) These are notes to myself. Your frame of reference, and therefore your calculations, may vary. These are not definitions—these are algorithms for success. Contributions are welcome. Happiness = Health + Wealth + Good Relationships Health = Exercise + Diet + Sleep Exercise = High Intensity Resistance Training + Sports + Rest Diet = Natural Foods + Intermittent Fasting + Plants Sleep = No alarms + 8–9 hours + Circadian rhythms Wealth = Income + Wealth * (Return on Investment) Income = Accountability + Leverage + Specific Knowledge Accountability = Personal Branding + Personal Platform + Taking Risk? Leverage = Capital + People + Intellectual Property Specific Knowledge = Knowing how to do something society cannot yet easily train other people to do Return on Investment = “Buy-and-Hold” + Valuation + Margin of Safety [72] Naval’s Rules (2016) Be present above all else. Desire is suffering. (Buddha) Anger is a hot coal you hold in your hand while waiting to throw it at someone else. (Buddha) If you can’t see yourself working with someone for life, don’t work with them for a day. Reading (learning) is the ultimate meta-skill and can be traded for anything else. All the real benefits in life come from compound interest. Earn with your mind, not your time. 99 percent of all effort is wasted. Total honesty at all times. It’s almost always possible to be honest and positive. Praise specifically, criticize generally. (Warren Buffett) Truth is that which has predictive power. Watch every thought. (Ask “Why am I having this thought?”) All greatness comes from suffering. Love is given, not received. Enlightenment is the space between your thoughts. (Eckhart Tolle) Mathematics is the language of nature.

In 2017, three research physiologists won the Nobel Prize for their four decades of work unraveling the mysteries of the circadian rhythm in biology. They found that the diurnal rhythm of nature affects the functioning of cells in plants, animals, humans, and even some single-cell bacteria. Specific genes change the function of cells based on the time of day. While this may seem like an esoteric set of discoveries, the new field of chronobiology has practical applications that have revolutionary implications for the future of wellness.

The circadian rhythm is an inner clock that follows the twenty-four hours in a day. The master clock sits in the master hormone gland in the middle of the brain, where it regulates the sleep-wake cycle and governs the clocks for the entire body. Each internal organ has its own clock, too, which is somehow coordinated by and with the master clock, so different functions turn on at different times of day. Next to the master hormone gland is a pine cone–shaped gland that makes melatonin, the hormone that induces sleep. The pine cone and the master gland talk to each other, synchronizing their roles to maximize a good night’s rest.

It takes effort and intention to take control of our environment and behaviors to bring our brain clock and body clocks back in sync and as close to the natural 24-hour light/dark cycle as we can. Sleep hygiene, like using blackout curtains to keep the bedroom dark, taking a hot shower or bath an hour before sleep to jump-start a temperature change in our body, shutting off devices and screens an hour before bed or using blue (and green) light-blocking glasses, or journaling or meditating for 20 minutes before bed can profoundly help rewire our clocks and reset our circadian rhythm.

In fact, several studies show that eating all our food within a 6- to 10-hour window regulates our circadian rhythms, which also leads to improvements in body composition, glycemic control, insulin sensitivity, oxidative stress, and energy levels.77,78,79,80 This is without changing any of the foods that we would normally eat.

Yet we need our elected representatives to remain connected to our everyday rhythms - of waking in the pale dawn to gently prod our children awake, the morning commute, the early evening conflict of a trip to the gym versus a wine or two, a late-night work email check, or the start of the late shift on a second job. Until technology intervenes to 'cure' our need for sleep, this is our life in the twenty-first century.

However, a prevailing view in psychiatry has been that mental disorders cause sleep disruption—a one-way street of influence. Instead, we have demonstrated that otherwise healthy people can experience a neurological pattern of brain activity similar to that observed in many of these psychiatric conditions simply by having their sleep disrupted or blocked. Indeed, many of the brain regions commonly impacted by psychiatric mood disorders are the same regions that are involved in sleep regulation and impacted by sleep loss. Further, many of the genes that show abnormalities in psychiatric illnesses are the same genes that help control sleep and our circadian rhythms.

The cycle of fighting and making up with a sister has an almost circadian rhythm to it, a comforting predictability. I never had a reason to think it would stop.

Infants and young children who show signs of autism, or who are diagnosed with autism, do not have normal sleep patterns or amounts. The circadian rhythms of autistic children are also weaker than their non-autistic counterparts, showing a flatter profile of melatonin across the twenty-four-hour period rather than a powerful rise in concentration at night and rapid fall throughout the day.II Biologically, it is as if the day and night are far less light and dark, respectively, for autistic individuals. As a consequence, there is a weaker signal for when stable wake and solid sleep should take place. Additionally, and perhaps related, the total amount of sleep that autistic children can generate is less than that of non-autistic children.

I was surprised the USA medical profession could not diagnose low blood oxygen levels, multiple chemical sensitivity to abnormal air, food intolerance, malnutrition, altitude hypersensitivity, loss of circadian rhythm and loss of moonlight synchronization.

Central eyesight, which allows us to “see” an object, is the last and slowest visual pathway to be activated during processing and yet, mistakenly, the most common way of evaluating visual function. Other pathways include peripheral eyesight that allows the brain to set a context for such objects, and many non-image-forming retinal pathways that link the external environment to internal systems that control sentience and metabolism. This last group of pathways is routed beneath conscious awareness directly from the retina to the body and affects such critical systems as balance, posture, hormones, neurotransmitters, circadian rhythms, etc. The interaction of all the non-image-forming signaling pathways modulates peripheral eyesight, and in turn the efficiency of central eyesight. Brain trauma such as that which Clark

Other simple practices? Supply all patients with earplugs and a face mask when they first come onto a ward, just like the complimentary air travel bag you are given on long haul flights. Use dim non-LED lighting at night and bright lighting during the day. This will help maintain strong circadian rhythms in patients, and thus a strong sleep wake pattern.

circadian rhythm. Your body benefits from the fixed sleeping pattern and you manage stress more efficiently. You fall asleep and wake up easily.

If you want to understand altitude sickness, you need to understand environmental radiation, light, temperature, nutrition, humidity, hypoxia, breathing gas, pressure, compression, decompression, vibrations, circadian rhythms and organ damage on the human biological system.

the more synchronized your circadian rhythms are, the better your life becomes.

Circadian rhythm influences many biological functions. To optimize circadian rhythm for performance, you need to add light and movement to the first twenty minutes upon waking up.

Anxiety and depression cannot be easily treated if the sufferer has unpredictable daily routines. The systems that mediate negative emotion are tightly tied to the properly cyclical circadian rhythms.

When I went to the medical profession complaining of fatigue, they put me on stimulants. They just override the fatigue feeling, but the cause of it is still there. They could not diagnose the circadian rhythm disorder and urea cycle disorder, both of which cause fatigue!

The burst of cortisol in the morning, generally between six and eight, is known as the cortisol awakening response (CAR). Under normal circumstances, your CAR gets you out of bed feeling restored. It also sets up one of your most important circadian rhythms, another crucial aspect of hormonal control. Operating on a twenty-four-hour cycle, circadian rhythms establish your biochemical and physiological peaks and valleys, almost like a tide within the body. When the cortisol tide is out, around midnight, and your cortisol is at its lowest, your cells perform their greatest repair and healing. If your cortisol is still high at night, your body can’t do the repair work it needs. Sometimes, when you should be winding down, you get a second wind. That’s no good: when you are most in need of rest, the high cortisol makes

History says that humans sleeping in moonlight turn into lunatics. Today that does not happen and one has to query why?

My research into how sleeping in moonlight affects humans came out of my awareness that apes sleep in moonlight.

Infants and young children who show signs of autism, or who are diagnosed with autism, do not have normal sleep patterns or amounts. The circadian rhythms of autistic children are also weaker than their non-autistic counterparts, showing a flatter profile of melatonin across the twenty-four-hour period rather than a powerful rise in concentration at night

Many police officers are shift workers and it is common for them to have symptoms of the medical condition of Shift Work Disorder.

When approaching a strange police officer, be aware that they may be taking a potent combination of prescription drugs for their physical and mental health conditions.

It is for such reasons that I always ask my clinical clients first about sleep. Do they wake up in the morning at approximately the time the typical person wakes up, and at the same time every day? If the answer is no, fixing that is the first thing I recommend. It doesn’t matter so much if they go to bed at the same time each evening, but waking up at a consistent hour is a necessity. Anxiety and depression cannot be easily treated if the sufferer has unpredictable daily routines. The systems that mediate negative emotion are tightly tied to the properly cyclical circadian rhythms.

I lost my circadian rhythm during extreme night shift work atop the very high altitude mountain of Mauna Kea in Hawaii. Waking up in the morning, staying awake during the daytime and sleeping has been problematic ever since.

I do bright light therapy.

For every day you are in a different timezone, your suprachiasmatic nucleus can only readjust by about one hour.

If you are not naturally waking up at sunrise, then it is likely you have some form of Circadian Rhythm Disorder.

Circadian Rhythm Disorder was a health risk during the COVID-19 lock down.

Studying mice, they discovered a "master clock" in a region of the brain (the dorsomedial nucleus) that can reset the circadian rhythm when faced with a shortage of food. The thinking is that when food is not an issue, lightness and darkness synchronize our sleep cycle. But when food is scarce, another system kicks in to synchronize our sleep cycle with our ability to find food.