SLEEP

SLEEP        

     Sleep and Immunity
It is now fairly proved that sleep has direct effect on the immune system. Our defenses against both bacterial and viral infection are found to be increased during sleep. On the other hand, sleep deprivation reduces our immunity against these diseases. The immune system also becomes overactive with sleep deprivation spending a lot of energy. This makes our body very tired and fatigued.

    Sleep and Beauty
Good sleep with enough deep sleep is found to be very effective to maintaining one's beauty. The skin gets refreshed with new cells during sleep. Both physical and psychological rejuvenation occurs at sleep.
All of us have experienced that if we did not get a restorative and refreshing sleep, we feel week like the old. Continuous insomnia, insufficient sleep or light sleep accelerates the aging process whereas effective deep sleep restores and rejuvenates us and aids in maintaining our physical beauty.

    Learning and Sleep
Many researchers argue that REM sleep is important for the transfer of learned material during wakefulness from Short Term Memory(STM) to Long Term Memory(LTM).

    Dream and Problem Solving
Many people including scientists, artists men of letters and even laymen have reported that they got new ideas from their dreams and even solutions to complex problems have been received through dreams. The famous chemist Kekule, who discovered the benzene ring, has said that he got the idea from his dream. The inventor of sewing machine also reported that he got the idea for designing the needle of the machine from his dream.

    Sleep and Food
It is a well known fact that the food and drinks we consume have significant effect on our sleep. Sleep researchers have found a list of such foods and drinks. Caffeine containing substances like tea, coffee, chocolate, soft drinks etc. are found to disturb sleep. Alcohol and smoking are also found to disturb your sleep. While alcohol may make you drowsy or even push you to sleep, such sleeps are never refreshing -- they are often low level sleep.
Malted milk products, on the other hand, have been found to have sleep-promoting effects.