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may make jet lag history Washington:
A software program that prescribes a regimen for avoiding jet lag using timed
light exposure has been created by researchers at Brigham and Women's Hospital
and the University of Michigan. The method has been described in the open-access
journal PLoS Computational Biology. Traveling across several times zones can cause
an individual to experience jet lag, which includes trouble sleeping at night
and difficulty remaining awake during the day. These effects largely reflect de-synchronization
between the body''s internal time clock and local environmental cues. Now, the
program, which seeks to re-synchronize the body with its new environment, considers
inputs like background light level and the number of time zones traveled. Then,
based on a mathematical model, the program gives users exact times of the day
when they should apply countermeasures such as bright light to intervene and reduce
the effects of jet lag. Timed light exposure is a well known synchronization method,
and when used properly, this intervention can reset an individual''s internal
clock to align with local time. The result is more efficient sleep, a decrease
in fatigue, and an increase in cognitive performance. Poorly timed light exposure
can prolong the re-synchronization process. Using their computational method,
researchers simulated shifting sleep-wake schedules and the subsequent light interventions
for realigning internal clocks with local time. They found that the mathematical
computation resulted in quicker design of schedules and also predictions of substantial
performance improvements. They were able to show that the computation provided
the optimal result for timing light exposure to reduce jet lag symptoms. "Using
this computation in a prototyped software application allows a user to set a background
light level and the number of time zones traveled to obtain a recommendation of
when to expose a subject to bright light, such as the bright lights sometimes
used to treat Seasonal Affective Disorder" said lead-author Dennis Dean. "Although
this method is not yet available to the public, it has direct implications for
designing schedules for jet lag, shift-work, and extreme environments, such as
in space, undersea or in polar regions," the expert added. "This work shows how
interventions can cut the number of days needed to adjust to a new time zone by
half," said co-author Daniel Forger. -July
15, 2009
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