Is your internal clock all out of whack? Going on a camping trip could help reset it back to a more natural rhythm, according to a new study.


Researchers from the University of Colorado at Boulder found that going on a week-long camping trip[1] seemed to synch the circadian clocks of eight people to sunrise and sunset.


Plus, the synching of biological clocks occurred even in people who were clearly early birds or night owls.


"When people are living in the modern world -- living in these constructed environments -- we have the opportunity to have a lot of differences among individuals. Some people are morning types and others like to stay up later," study researcher Kenneth Wright, an integrative physiology professor at the university, said in a statement. "What we found is that natural light-dark cycles[2] provide a strong signal that reduces the differences that we see among people -- night owls and early birds -- dramatically."


The study, published in the journal Current Biology[3] , involved eight people who wore wrist monitors for one week that recorded their light exposure, the timing of that exposure, and their activity throughout the day (so researchers could get an idea of their sleep habits). The participants also underwent lab monitoring so that researchers could measure their melatonin levels, which helped to clue them in to the timing of their circadian clocks (our bodies release melatonin naturally when they sense that it's nighttime and it's time to go to sleep).


Then, all the study participants went on a week-long camping trip in the Eagles Nest Wilderness in Colorado. During this time, they had no access whatsoever to electric light (including light from flashlights and personal technology devices); the only light they had was from the sun and campfires.


The study participants underwent the same wrist monitor and melatonin testing after their camping trip. Researchers found that their biological nighttimes -- dictated by melatonin levels -- started two hours later before going on the trip, compared with after. Plus, they found that before the trip, the study participants tended to wake up before their biological nighttimes were technically over.



After the camping trip, researchers found that the study participants' internal clocks were much more synched to sunrise and sunset. Their biological nighttimes started around the time of sunset, and they also tended to wake up right before the biological nighttime ended.


Electric light has been fingered in the past for playing a role in impaired sleep. A perspective piece published earlier this year in the journal Nature suggested that the advent of electric light has affected our natural sleep cycles[4] , and may contribute to the rise of sleep problems.


"Technology has effectively decoupled us from the natural 24-hour day[5] to which our bodies evolved, driving us to go to bed later," the author of the article, Harvard professor Charles A. Czeisler, M.D., Ph.D., wrote. "And we use caffeine in the morning to rise as early as we ever did, putting the squeeze on sleep."



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  • Hurts Your Sleep


    A study of police officers found a strong link between working the night or evening shift, and <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/21/police-sleep-shift-work-_n_1686727.html">getting fewer than six hours of sleep</a> a day. The research, published in the journal <em>Workplace Health & Safety</em>, also showed that police officers who got fewer than six hours of sleep a day had more than a <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/21/police-sleep-shift-work-_n_1686727.html">doubled risk of bad quality sleep</a>, compared with those who got six or more hours of sleep a day. And in another study in the journal <em>SLEEP</em>, University of Buenos Aires researchers found that shift workers were more likely to experience <a href="http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/story/2007/08/02/serotonin-shift.html">lower serotonin levels</a> than non shift workers, which could thereby impact sleep, CBC reported. Serotonin, the "feel-good hormone," is also known to impact sleep.




  • Raises Breast Cancer Risk


    Working the night shift raises <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/01/shift-work-breast-cancer-night-sleep_n_1612486.html">a woman's risk of breast cancer</a> risk by 30 percent, according to a study in the <em>International Journal of Cancer</em>. Specifically, French researchers found that the breast cancer risk of women who <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/01/shift-work-breast-cancer-night-sleep_n_1612486.html">worked the night shift</a> for four years was <em>especially</em> clear, as well as those who only worked the night shift for three or fewer nights a week (meaning their daily rhythms were disturbed more often).




  • Raises Obesity And Diabetes Risks


    Sleeping too little or sleeping "against" your body's natural biological clock could increase the likelihood of <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/11/shift-work-sleep-type-2-diabetes-obesity_n_1418394.html">developing diabetes or becoming obese</a>, according to a study from Brigham and Women's Hospital researchers in the journal <em>Science Translational Medicine</em>. While the study was small -- it only included 21 people! -- the findings are valuable because it was a controlled study, meaning it placed people in an environment where scientists decided how much sleep they got each day, and what time they were able to go to sleep. "Since night workers often have a hard time sleeping during the day, they can face both <a href="http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-04/bawh-lsd040612.php">circadian disruption</a> working at night and insufficient sleep during the day," study researcher Orfeo M. Buxton, Ph.D., a neuroscientist at Brigham and Women's Hospital, said in a statement. "The evidence is clear that getting enough sleep is important for health, and that sleep should be at night for best effect." Plus, another study in the journal <em>PLoS Medicine</em> showed that rotating shift workers had a <a href="http://healthland.time.com/2011/12/07/why-working-the-night-shift-may-boost-your-risk-of-diabetes/">higher Type 2 diabetes risk</a>, likely because of shift work's impact on insulin activity, <em>TIME</em> reported.




  • Increases Heart Attack Risk


    Working the night shift could make you more likely to <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2012/07/26/shift-work-heart-health_n_1708093.html?utm_hp_ref=health-news&ir=Health%20News&ncid=edlinkusaolp00000008">have a heart attack</a>, according to a review of research published in the <em>British Medical Journal</em>. The review included 34 studies, and showed that working the night shift could account for <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2012/07/26/shift-work-heart-health_n_1708093.html?utm_hp_ref=health-news&ir=Health%20News&ncid=edlinkusaolp00000008">7 percent of heart attacks</a> that occurred in 2009 and 2010 in Canada, as well as 1.6 percent of ischemic strokes and 7.3 percent of coronary events during that time period, CBC reported.




  • Provokes Negative Metabolic Changes


    Night shift work could lead to <a href="http://news.health.com/2009/03/03/night-shift-work-hard-on-heart/">lower levels of leptin</a>, the hormone known to play a role in regulating weight, as well as affect blood sugar and insulin levels, Health.com. reported. The findings, published in 2009 in the journal <em>Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences</em>, suggest that these changes could lead to a higher risk of <a href="http://news.health.com/2009/03/03/night-shift-work-hard-on-heart/">serious health conditions</a> like diabetes and heart disease, according to Health.com.




  • Makes You More Likely To Be Injured At Work


    Working the night shift could nearly double your risk of suffering a workplace injury, according to University of British Columbia researchers. Their findings, published in <a href="http://www.sjweh.fi/show_abstract.php?abstract_id=3124">the <em>Scandinavian Journal of Work, Environment and Health</em></a>, reveal that work injuries on a whole in Canada have gone down between 1996 and 2007, but they didn't go down at all among people who work at night. "The disruption of normal sleep patterns due to shift work can <a href="http://www.publicaffairs.ubc.ca/2010/11/02/mr-10-163/">cause drowsiness or fatigue</a>, which can lead to workplace injuries," study research Imelda Wong, a Ph.D. Candidate at the University of British Columbia's School of Environmental Health, said in a statement. "Our research shows that people working rotating and night shifts are more likely to experience an injury than those who work regular day hours."




  • Ups Depression Risk


    Numerous studies have suggested that shift work could have an impact on mental health. For example, a study in <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9891131">the <em>International Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health</em></a> showed that depression occurs at a higher rate among shift workers than non shift workers. And in a 2008 study in the <em>International Journal on Disability and Human Development</em>, researchers found that "shift work is suggested to increase the risk of <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2559945/">developing or aggravating mood disorders</a> at least in vulnerable individuals," though they also acknowledged that some experts say depression risk may have more to do with the actual job than working the night shift.




  • Sleep Help for the Graveyard Shift


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