2023-07-19 09:01:35
This is indicated by international research, which has also found an association between the habit of “siesta” and a greater brain volume
Last summer, a study by Northwestern University published in Current Biology indicated that temperatures above 25 degrees Celsius easily lead to a siesta because there is a brain thermometer that regulates the body’s metabolism according to external temperatures. With global warming, we have now abundantly exceeded these temperatures, but according to a study just published by the Universities of Montevideo and London and the Center for Genomic Medicine in Boston and the Broad Institute in Cambridge, there is a genetic predisposition to siesta which at the same time is associated with a greater brain development and (perhaps) even a reduced risk of Alzheimer’s disease.
I study
“The study would indicate that those who habitually take a siesta gain in the long term between 2.6 and 6.5 years of brain aging – comments Giuseppe Plazzi, of the University of Modena, Reggio Emilia, Past-President Aims (Ass. It. Sleep Medicine) and President of the European Narcolepsy Network —. Immediate benefits are evident with a siesta of between 5 to 15 minutes and can last for 1 to 3 hours after the afternoon nap. If, on the other hand, this exceeds half an hour, a transitory deterioration of cognitive performance is observed». The international research examined about 500,000 subjects of both sexes between the ages of 40 and 69 who were first evaluated with GWAS studies, i.e. genome-wide association which evaluates all the genetic variations of the individuals under examination by correlating them to the differences of some particular traits. This evaluation highlighted a genetic predisposition to give in to the afternoon nap that increases with the heat.
15 grams of brain
These subjects were then also evaluated using brain imaging and it turned out that this genetic predisposition was associated with the development of a greater brain volume, resulting on average of 15.80 cm3, i.e. approximately 15 grams of gray matter more. According to the authors, this could suggest some protection against neurodegeneration and against the damage resulting from lack of nocturnal sleep demonstrated by a historic 2021 study by Ukrainian researchers at Masaryk University directed by Viktória Kokošová. Considering that on average everyone experiences a general decline in total brain volume of between 0.2% and 0.5% per year, this finding could indicate that those who regularly take a siesta earn between 2.6 and 6 .5 years of brain aging. However, hippocampal volume did not increase, nor did reaction time and visual memory improve.
Cautions
“The fact that an association between the siesta, immediate cognitive improvements and an increase in the volume of the hippocampus, a fundamental brain area in the consolidation of memories during sleep, has not been highlighted – underlines Alfredo Berardelli, professor of Neurology at La Sapienza University of Rome and President of the Italian Society of Neurology – could indicate that there are other areas of the brain, such as those of vigilance, to be influenced by the habit of daytime napping and it will be necessary to investigate this correlation to reveal all the actors of this positive effect from the heat before saying that the siesta fights Alzheimer’s disease ».
July 19, 2023 (change July 19, 2023 | 08:53)
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