HN Gopher Feed (2017-12-18) - page 1 of 10 ___________________________________________________________________
Older Adults' Forgetfulness Tied to Faulty Brain Rhythms in Sleep
100 points by jaytaylor
http://npr.org/sections/health-shots/2017/12/18/571120472/older-...___________________________________________________________________
SpikeDad - 1 hours ago
Oh geez. Wondering why my sleep quality has diminished as I got
older and my memory, um... Forgot what I was going to say. 8-(
leggomylibro - 1 hours ago
I've been wondering about this lately. Honestly, and it kind of
pains me to say this, I'm coming to the conclusion that alcohol is
Bad.Hey, quit laughing - I don't think that it is necessarily
unhealthy to try and smooth out some of the bumps along life's
road, but there have got to be better ways. And don't say,
'exercise.'The cognitive hits of alcohol are just looking like
they're too long term. Not even over a lifetime, but over a week.
With all the information coming in about how it messes with our REM
cycles and potentially inhibits learning that took place over the
past day or two from sticking to your brain...I dunno.What is the
point of dropping your day's problems on the floor in the evening
if doing so prevents you from learning or benefiting from the
experience?Edit: By which I mean, alcohol seems to cause a lot of
issues around what your brain does while it sleeps, which seems to
be what this article is calling out as a problem that can be
exacerbated with age. Sorry, I guess I kind of jumped between
topics there...
satysin - 5 minutes ago
I stopped drinking alcohol when I was 18 (I am 33 now) as I could
see it was effecting how well I could study. Poor sleep, hang
overs, etc. made me want to take a break for a few months to
concentrate on other things in my life.6 months later I realised
life was way better without alcohol. I was more motivated, I
slept much better, I felt better, I could study and retain things
much better than before.I wasn't a super heavy drinker, I am from
the UK so started to drink with friends at around 16. Over the
past 15 years binge drinking has become a big problem IMHO. I
feel I am lucky to have avoided that!So here I am 15 years later
and still not drinking with the exception of my sisters wedding
when I had champagne at the toast of course.I would recommend
taking a year off alcohol and see how it changes your life. Maybe
it won't make as big a difference as it did for me but I would be
shocked if it didn't make some noticeable differences to your
brain.
vowelless - 1 hours ago
I don't understand the relevance of this comment. The article
makes no reference to alcohol.
alexchantavy - 1 hours ago
Agreed, but I'm super interested in learning more if there's
evidence.
leggomylibro - 1 hours ago
The whole sleep rhythm thing; sorry, I've just read a handful
of articles in the past few weeks talking about how alcohol
disrupts our normal sleep cycles which prevents a lot of the
brain's...I dunno, whatever hygiene it has to do when we sleep.
And that is what the article is about.
md224 - 2 minutes ago
The thing is that alcohol is a very crude intoxicant, and we
seem to have arbitrarily standardized on it as the Socially
Acceptable Drug. I know this is obvious, but it really is
stupid.I mean, take khat, for instance. Khat is a stimulant
chewed by people in Yemen; it's their socially acceptable
drug-of-choice. But here? It's illegal. Why? I don't know.
Our drug laws are just crazy stupid.I feel like we could do
so much better in terms of recreational substances. People
are finally getting smart about cannabis, but there are still
so many possibilities we're not exploring. The fact that
we're stuck with alcohol is ridiculous. I mean hell, even
opioids are less harmful to the body than alcohol is (if
taken at a steady, stable dose, which I guess is the hard
part).We should definitely be spending most of our scientific
brainpower on curing diseases, but I feel like we could spare
a few brilliant minds to work on better intoxicants. The
masses deserve a safer opiate.
make3 - 28 minutes ago
They have similar/almost identical preoccupations, ie, the
preservation of one's mental capacities when aging
trashcan - 1 hours ago
Alcohol isn't mentioned once in the linked article - what is the
context here?
toomuchtodo - 1 hours ago
Alcohol consumption ruins your chance at good sleep.https://pub
s.niaaa.nih.gov/publications/arh25-2/101-109.htmhttps://www.ncb
i.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23347102https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubme
d/21323679
[deleted]
jghn - 22 minutes ago
I recently got an apple watch and along the way installed a sleep
tracking app. I was skeptical of its accuracy until I realized
that I could identify the nights I'd been drinking with 100%
accuracy as those nights the tracker didn't seem to think I slept
hardly at all. I always knew I'd be tired the next day but this
was eye opening.
ProAm - 4 minutes ago
This is because alcohol is an anesthetic. And the human body
will tend to wake up after an anesthetic wears off. I believe
the anesthetic properties of alcohol lasts roughly 4 hours, so
if you sleep you'll probably begin to stir and wake up 4 hours
after your last drink. Very similar to surgery patients who
naturally wake up after the anesthetic used for surgery wears
off.
36bydesign - 15 minutes ago
What app did you use? I want to try this also.
LeoPanthera - 9 minutes ago
Not OP but I use Autosleep. Works well.
JauntyHatAngle - 9 minutes ago
Anecdotal, but my fitbit gave me the same result.Every single
time I had drunk - even 1-2 - there was a spike of restlessness
that night, 10-20 restless periods vs the 3-4 I would have
normally.
[deleted]
27182818284 - 1 hours ago
One of the more fascinating parts to me was how little it took:"If
you're like 50 milliseconds too early, 50 milliseconds too late,
then the storing mechanism actually doesn't work."
sp332 - 53 minutes ago
The cycles are 12 Hz, which is only ~80 ms between pulses. So 40
ms is exactly out of phase.
hathawsh - 52 minutes ago
Fascinating indeed. That's not very different from the timing of
common music. Could it be that our appreciation of music is
somehow related to the way our brains work?
yesenadam - 35 minutes ago
Hmm.. which common music? I like really fast music (e.g.
Coltrane, Charlie Parker) and really slow (Rachmaninov 2nd
Symphony, Mahler Adagietto).
Will_Parker - 4 minutes ago
The artists still produced music in tempos quite within the
range of human heartbeats and / or breathing.
stevemk14ebr - 34 minutes ago
I think music's appeal is related to the rythmns of heartbeats.
Logic being you find comfort in being close to another human,
an advantage to be in pairs. Therefore the brain is hardwired
to prefer rythmns around that pace.Just my theory though
trendia - 18 minutes ago
From the paper, it looks like the area involved is the medial pre-
frontal cortex (mPFC). Give mPFC's role in memory, my initial
suspicion is that the brain rhythms are a symptom, and not a cause,
of memory loss. That means that fixing the brain rhythms might not
fix the underlying memory problems.It's also worthy to note that
moderate exercise can improve connectivity of the mPFC, so that is
at least one way to avoid these troubles.
harshaw - 54 minutes ago
I wonder if this is at all related to the idea of interactive
metronome therapy. See https://www.interactivemetronome.com/what-
is-imIm seems to be about improving "Neurotiming".
sabujp - 10 minutes ago
so basically proving the old adage that it's hard to teach an old
dog new tricks ..but maybe we can get around this by wearing
electrodes on our heads to fix this as we get older, one can only
hope.
chiefalchemist - 53 minutes ago
Sleep allows the brain to catch up on the day's events. That is, it
buffers certain things to be processed in full later. Disrupt that
process - e.g., not enough sleep, alcohol (as a REM sleep
disruptor) - and memory will go sideways.I'd be interested in
knowing how many of the prescription drugs common among older
adults have REM disruption as a side-effect. I wonder if that's
even tested for. Perhaps we're managing one set of ills only to
create another?
rectangletangle - 47 minutes ago
Although not normally considered a prescription drug, Cannabis
has marked affects on the REM sleep phase.
blacksmith_tb - 7 minutes ago
Some research exists[1] though limited to testing with THC, so
it wouldn't be strictly accurate to say 'cannabis' (for
example, it would also be worth doing a similar study on CBD,
as it has quite a few interesting properties as well).1:
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-teenage-mind/200906...
[deleted]
jimhefferon - 17 minutes ago
Which are ...? (not a cannabis user, just curious).
kharms - 11 minutes ago
According to a study from the 70s, cannabis interferes with
REM sleep.https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-teenage-
mind/200906...
rectangletangle - 8 minutes ago
Generally heavy cannabis users don't dream as often or
vividly as normal. One of the primary symptoms of Cannabis
withdrawal is extremely vivid dreams.As far as the
implications of this go, your guess is as good as mine.