Poor Sleep Alters Metabolism and Boosts Body's Ability To Store Fat, Study Finds (theguardian.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: The latest study provides new evidence that sleep deprivation has a direct influence on basic metabolism and the body's balance between fat and muscle mass. In the study, published in the journal Science Advances, 15 healthy volunteers each attended a testing session on two occasions, once after a normal night's sleep and once after staying up all night. During the visit, they gave samples of fat and muscle tissue and blood. After sleep deprivation, people's fat tissue showed changes in gene activity that are linked to cells increasing their tendency to absorb lipids and also to proliferate.

By contrast, in muscle the scientists saw reduced levels of structural proteins, which are the building blocks the body requires to maintain and build muscle mass. Previous epidemiological studies have also found shift workers and those who sleep less have lower muscle mass. This may be in part down to lifestyle factors, but the latest work shows that there are also fundamental biological mechanisms at play. The study also found an increase in inflammation in the body after sleep deprivation, which is a known risk factor for type 2 diabetes.

Comments

Not surprising, but good data to have.

[Mal-2]

Sleep deprivation is a source of chronic stress at a basic level. It's not all that surprising that it causes neurological effects, but ALSO systemic stress-related effects.

Something I've been wondering

[rsilvergun]

more and more we're finding that people's failings aren't their own. That a variety of physical ailments have broad, cascading effects on every aspect of human life. We figured out that underfed women give birth to babies with reduced mental capacity. That poverty and stress impact rational behavior and decision making. That people sleep less as they age due to hormonal changes and now that lack of sleep leads to weight gain (gut bacteria play a big role too).

As long as I've been alive one of the central narratives in my life has been that people who fail at life did so because they lack good moral character. It's been pretty well pounded into my skull. Sometimes overtly ( "Welfare Queens" and folks convinced panhandlers are making a kililng ) and sometimes less so ("You can be do anything if you put your mind to it!" and "Pull yourself up by your bootstraps!").

Science is challenging that. There really are "born losers". Folks for whom nothing ever seems to go right because it doesn't. Moreover life really does kick you when you're down.

What I'm wondering is if we're going to change anything in response. I don't expect the public at large to. But, well, /. is a science focused forum. And the science is pretty clear here. So are we going to start seeing a change of mind? And are we going to see folks acting on that?

I'm not so sure. Yeah, this is a science oriented forum, but it's also a forum with an aging population. And as people get older they get more conservative. Less emphatic. Funny that; I read somewhere science has found that the part of your brain associated with empathy atrophies in old age...

Re:Something I've been wondering

[Anonymous Coward]

It is *also* true that certain character flaws will lead to one being a failure. People who refuse to take responsibility and self-motivate are never going to achieve as much.

So, a fat person may be fat because of their combination of metabolism and gut bacteria and so on. Such that when they eat a normal and reasonable amount of food, and even get some exercise, they stay fat. That happens. But it *also* happens that some people just over-indulge in unhealthy food and they don't exercise at all.

And further, in the former case, the person is not doomed. If the person is truly motivated, they can bust their ass, eat super-healthy, and even do things like get a fecal transplant to favor the correct gut bacteria, and make significant improvement. The temptation is to point at the science and throw up one's hands in defeat, using it as an enabler of continued bad behavior.

This doesn't mean that wisdom and morality will fix one's problems. Depending on details, it is simply not enough. But neither is the opposite extreme true. Personal problems are still very heavily influenced by one's character, and the need for personal responsibility is still present.

What really hurts me is that huge numbers of people, most people, in fact, are born into poverty. The hand they are dealt is bad from the get-go. Even if they somehow manage to be brilliant saints, the sheer lack of economic opportunity keeps them trapped forever. It is unfair, and it is the most common case. I support poverty-fighting charities but there is only so much that can be done. Poverty *sucks,* and I consider it to be the greatest evil that flourishes within our species (though it is not unique to us, of course).

Maybe, someday, we will find a better way. It hurts me that the current state is still the best we can do.

Re:External locus of control

[Pfhorrest]

Calories eaten and absorbed minus calories burnt from exercise and resting metabolism will be stored as fat, sure. You might note that some parts of that sentence describe things not under voluntary control. I've italicized them for you in case your obvious mental deficit makes them hard for you to find.

You know there are literally drugs that will make people just drop weight off, right? Problem is they have a bunch of terrible side-effects. These things were sold, and then problems with them found, and lawsuits were had over all of that. If you can put a chemical into a fat person and that will make them thin (so long as you don't care about the other health issues it causes) there are obviously factors at play besides just gluttony and sloth.

Research like this is looking to what else, aside from those kinds of drugs, might affect those factors.

Re: sleep affects hormones

[Ionized]

you're pretty smug for someone that is so terribly fucking wrong

'100 calories' is not the exact immutable block you think it is. calories as it pertains to human diet are an inexact & best-guess science. 100 calories for you may not be 100 calories for someone else.

differences in gut bacteria can have drastically different effects in nutrient & energy absorption. differences in metabolism can affect the amount of calories burnt by two individuals performing the same actions.

two different people could eat the exact same food, perform the exact same physical activities, and one could gain weight while the other lost weight.