![]() ![]() Indeed, “after just one night of only four or five hours’ sleep,” Walker tells The Guardian, “your natural killer cells-the ones that attack the cancer cells that appear in your body every day-drop by 70%.” Sleep deprivation has such serious outcomes that “the World Health Organisation has classed any form of night-time shift work as a probable carcinogen.” Lack of sleep, however, is “increasing our risk of cancer, heart attack and Alzheimer’s,” notes Cooke. The benefits of sound sleep include enhanced creativity and concentration, lower blood pressure, better mood regulation, and higher immunity and fertility. “To be specific,” writes Rachel Cooke at The Guardian, “he is the director of the Center for Human Sleep Science at the University of California, a research institute whose goal-possibly unachievable-is to understand everything about sleep’s impact on us, from birth to death, in sickness and health.” Why should we listen to him? Well, he isn’t just any sleep scientist. Walker has a lot more to say about sleep in the interview below, including tips for getting there, whether you can make up for lost sleep (you can’t), and why you shouldn’t yank teenagers out of bed on the weekends. ![]() Ask him about “the downside of pulling an all-nighter, and he’ll rattle off a list of ill effects that range from memory loss and a compromised immune system to junk food cravings and wild mood swings.” The neuroscientist tells Terry Gross on Fresh Air, “Every disease that is killing us in developed nations has causal and significant links to a lack of sleep.” Walker is something of a “sleep evangelist,” notes Berkeley News. That number may vary from person to person, but fewer than six can be highly detrimental. The National Sleep Foundation recommends that adults sleep an average of eight hours a night. “Sleep,” he says, “is a non-negotiable biological necessity.“ ![]() “Short sleep predicts a shorter life,” explains sleep researcher Matthew Walker in the RSA animation Sleep or Die, above. If you wait until you’re dead to sleep, you’ll be dead sooner than you think. We need proper sleep like we need good food, low stress, engaging pursuits, etc.-to thrive and live a long and happy life. Two-four hours per 24-hour cycle should be enough, right? Wrong. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could fix the work/life thing by chucking out the difference? At home, you’re in the office, at the office, you’re at home, always on and never off-sleep, optional. ![]()
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