Figure 4:
Melatonin
Figure 5 (Next Page):
Photomicrograph of the master circadian clock, the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN), and examples of overt circadian rhythms in several mammalian species. Upper left panel: coronal section of Nissl stained fetal sheep bilateral suprachiasmatic nuclei (SCN; one is indicated by white arrows); V: third ventricle, bar: 500 µm. Upper right panel: melatonin rhythm in pregnant ewes and their fetuses (closed and open circles, respectively); (mean ± S.E.; n=4). Lower left panel: double plot of locomotor activity rhythm in a rat. Each line represents the recordings of two successive days. Initial recordings were done under ad libitum feeding in which the rat shows a nocturnal pattern of activity. The arrow indicates initiation of a restricted pattern of feeding in which food was available from 10:00 to 11:00 hours. Note the shift in the activity rhythm. Lower right panel: body temperature rhythm in adult capuchin monkeys (mean ± S.E.; n=4). Dark bars indicate hours without light.
Circadian rhythms are essential for eukaryotic life. For instance the pulse, blood pressure, temperature, rate of cell division, blood cell count, alertness, urine composition, metabolic rate, sex drive, and responsiveness to medications all fluctuate in circadian manner.Therefore are one of the most important issues of human body.
Some of the physiological processes that fluctuate within a biological rhythm can be exampled as listed below:
-
Body temperature varies during a 24-hour period by as much as 0.5°C .
Figure 6
- Blood pressure may change as much as 20% during the day.
Figure 7
- The number of white blood cells can vary by 50% during the day.
- Many hormones follow rhythmic cycles.
- The male sex hormone testosterone follows a 24-hour cycle. The highest levels occur in the night, particularly during dream sleep also known as REM sleep.
- The menstrual cycle, for instance, is a recurring series of events in the reproductive functions of women that lasts, on average, 28 days. During the menstrual cycle, levels of female sex hormone estrogen undergo dramatic shifts. Estrogen concentrations in the blood are low at the beginning of each cycle and peak on day 14, when ovulation normally occurs. Throughout the remaining 14 days, estrogen levelsare rather high. Then they drop off when a new cycle begins. Estogen levels follow this cycle month after month in women of reproductive age.
-
The skin reacts differently depending on the time of the day
- Morning:
Fewer reactions to allergens
Greater reactions to tuberculin tests
Higher skin penetration of nicotin
- Afternoon:
Higher rate of lidocaine uptake
Analgesic effect 2-3 times longer
Better effects of corticosteroid creams
- Late evening and night:
Histamine sensitivity
Itching (atopis dermatitis)
Epidermal cell proliferation (psoriasis)
Cancer risk after contact with carcinogens
Figure 8:
A schedule of daily rhythms
This schedule reflects average times during the day which young adults experience highs and lows of various activities. It assumes that you go to sleep about 11 p.m., sleep soundly, and waken at about 6 a.m. If your day runs earlier or later, the schedule is shifted by a corresponding amount.
About problems related with biological rhythm:
JETLAG:
Jetlag is desynchronization in biological rhythm happens when crossed a number of time zones in an air plane, when we reach our destination, our internal clock and real timing are not synchronized.
For instance, a traveler from USA to Paris starts his vacation with four days of disorientation. Two hours after midnight, he will be sitting up in his bed looking for his coffee and croissants. Two hours past noon he will be ready for bed. His body will gradually shift to a new routine as melatonin secretion becomes adjusted so that the hormone signals begin arriving at their target neurons on Paris time.
Figure 9: Graph and Information on how missed sleep effect sleep-wake cycle
WINTER BLUES (Winter Depression):
Symptoms of severe winter blues, or seasonal affective disorder (SAD) are depression and an overwhelming desire to sleep. This discomfort may result from a internal clock that is not synchronized with the changes in day length during winter (when days are shorter and nights are longer). Their symptoms worsen when they are given doses o melatonin. And they improve dramatically when they are exposed to intense light, which shuts down pineal activity.
INSOMNIA:
Insomnia can be best defined as a condition of inadequate or poor quality sleep. It is characterized by the inability to fall and/or the inability to remain asleep for a reasonable amount of time. Insomniacs have been known to complain about being unable to close their eyes or "rest their mind" for more than a few minutes at a time. It is a problem that affects a great many people. Besides some other reasons that can bring in insomnia, like depression or chronic anxiety, changes in one’s daily routine is the most common cause of insomnia. For instance, travel, starting a new job or a new semester, going into hospital, sleeping in a strange environment, moving into a new home, and anxiety over job interviews or tests are some possible causes of insomnia.
MONDAY MORNING BLUES:
Our behavioral activities are governed by artificial cycles of light, whereas our physiological activities are governed by natural cycles. Therefore, modern life applications give us the chance to wake before dawn, or sleep late after sunset. When we stay much later on Saturday night, sleep much later on Sunday morning, we suffer the consequences on Monday morning when our biological clock is desynchronized.
Such minor problems about sleep is also very common among people. At least, we can say that many people claim that they don’t sleep enough or effectively. They claim mostly that the time they slept is less than needed. Here a question occurs. How can we realize a relationship between the number of hours slept and the soundness of the sleep? For average, a normal sound sleep shouldn’t be less than 6 hours and more than 9 hours. Which means that sound sleep doesn’t only have a minimum limit but also a maximum limit. Another major advice on sleep is to sleep at the same time every night which will regulate our internal clock, as sleep-wake cycle is a major issue of biological rhythm.
Therefore it can be hypothised that the number of hours slept should be parallel to our biological rhythm for us to have a sound sleep. Which means that the most effective night sleep would occur when sleep in a rhythmic structure every night and obey these hours in a fairly strict way.
It can be predicted that if we sleep parallel to our biological rhythm and therefore sleep in the number of average sleep hour, we would have the most sound and effective night sleep.
Method Development:
In order to do the investigation on the relationship between soundness of sleep and sleep hours, in the first step, one needs to have the data of how many hours slept. It seems quite easy as one can calculate this timing by recording the times of waking up and setting to sleep. The longer the duration of the record, the less error in investigation. 14 days (2 weeks) of recording will be used in this paper.
In order to relate our biological rhythm to the issue, one needs to set a standard for the internal clock. For these standards, the most useful and practical criteria would be a numerical average. Therefore the average of the hours slept will be essential for this investigation.
The soundness of the sleep is quite a difficult criteria to have a numerical value to show. Consequently the variable will be chosen from a very narrow range. As one wakes up, if they have slept soundly, he or she should get up without difficulty. If the difficulty occurs it would probably show itself with begging for some more minutes or not willing to get up. This will would bring in some time between the stimulus that makes the one wake (a bell ringing or someone calling the one to wake up) and getting up. The one can even fall asleep again, which will show how weak the sleep was. Therefore, the most practical criteria to determine the soundness of the sleep would be the number of minutes that pass after the bell rings (or being called to wake up) and before getting up. One can determine when the bell would ring and record the minutes that pass after that moment as soon as he or she gets up and record the data. As the habits of the one is effective we can take the most common timing as the habit and calculate the deflection in order to see if there has happened any problem with waking and use the percentage increase in this time to determine if it has become harder for the one to wake up and how much with respect to each other.
Therefore the method can be based on these two variables: number of hours slept and the minutes that pass between the stimulus to wake and getting up.
Method:
Within two weeks, each day, the time of waking is set with a bell, and recorded with the hours that one sets herself or himself to sleep. Also the times the one actually gets up is recorded.
Using these raw data, calculations will be done on number of hours slept. The average of these processed data will be used to determine the biological clock of the one. The deflection of each night from the average in particular will determine how parallel to his or her internal clock one slept.
The other calculation will be done on how many minutes passed after the waking stimulus and actual waking. These data will determine the soundness of the night sleep. The common habit on the issue will be determined and with respect to this value how harder it got to wake up will b e calculated.
Data Collection
Table 1:
Data Processing:
Table 2:
Average length of sleep = 8.03 hours
( calculated using a Sharp EL-512 calculator )
Deflection will be calculated by showing the difference of that night sleep in particular with the average.
Table 3:
Table 4:
Graph 1:
Graph of the processed data
Conclusion:
As we can see on Graph 1 ,
When sleep lengths were so deflected from average, soundness of the sleep decreased, which will offend my hypothesis. Around 2nd of December 2007, one was made to sleep not in a parallel way to his or her own rhythm, which brought in the result of difficulty in waking up in the morning. From this point of view my hypothesis is found to be true.
On the other hand, on 8th of December 2007, there was no major deflection from the rhythm, besides there was a major deflection in soundness of the sleep. So that my hypothesis as not proved to be true
These results, therefore, are not fully powerful to come to a decision on the issue. But still it can be stated that, if we are parallel to our biological sleep-wake cycle rhythm, we are more likely to have a sound sleep, whereas this cycle and soundness of the sleep is not rightly proportional.
Evaluation:
This investigation has quite a lot of problems, indeed. Some of which are quite hard to decrease, especially if the one whose sleep and wake cycle is investigated has a normal modern life. Sources of error can be listed as below:
- This investigation has taken all time from getting into bed to waking up as sleeping. Here occurs two major problems. Firstly, one doesn’t fall asleep as soon as he or she gets into bed. There is some time between getting into bed and falling asleep. Secondly, not all the time throughout the night must be sleeping time. One may wake up for necessities or be awake around some time in the night. Some of these time may not even be remembered.
- Investigation has a very limited time of data collection. Two weeks doesn’t even make up for some circles of human body (for instance it doesn’t include a full menstrual cycle which might be effective on the results). It should have been at least a full month or better longer. The longer the investigation, the better results we obtain.
- This investigation was made on a high school student at TED Ankara College. The student had the stress to wake up early not to miss the school bus, which will decrease self-control in sleep-wake cycle and effect the results.
- The investigation can not serve us an objective view at the rhythm of the one. This weeks may have included the days which she slept the most throughout his or her life.
- As the one is pressurized to have a logical sleep-wake cycle, she was made to sleep, or awake by others, authorities in home.
- The little periods which may have been spent for sleep throughout the day (for instance falling asleep on school bus) was neglected.
- Hot milk or coffee can change one’s sleep-wake cycle, which was neglected to hold constant.
- A sound sleep doesn’t only have the criteria of timing, but place, tranquility and others, which are not controlled in this investigation.
- Tiredness of a person doesn’t only depend on one’s timing of sleep. Stress, work, alcohol usage and some others can also effect on the sleeping results.
- After the bell, for three times throughout the investigation, the one fell asleep again after waking up for the bell and those times were not counted for sleep; which decreases the accuracy.
In order to reduce errors, we can redo an investigation on the issue where most of the uncontrolled variables of this one is made to stay constant or are taken into calculation. (coffee, milk, day sleeping, awaking at night etc.) Also, the investigation would be more accurate if the outer pressures were reduced (being made to sleep, school bus stress, not being late to school etc.)
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