Your body and brain benefit from sleep, which is a natural process. Your body and mind both slow down their activities and processes during the night. Digestion and kidney function also slow down, which means that you are more likely to fall asleep at a slower rate. Lack of sleep damages many systems in your body. Insufficient sleep can lead to health problems and chronic diseases, but the most obvious effects of not sleeping are on your mind. Here are three ways to make your sleep better.
The timing of sleep is controlled by a complex neurochemical system called the circadian clock, or Process C. This biological clock uses signals from the environment to create an internal day-night cycle. It counteracts the homeostatic drive to sleep during the day and augments sleep during the night. Located in the suprachiasmatic nucleus, the circadian rhythm regulates sleep and wakefulness. The body’s circadian clock and other secondary clock systems are found throughout the body.
The circadian rhythm is a cycle of different stages of sleep. During the first phase of sleep, most of your body is in non-REM sleep, and the second half of the night, you spend most of your time in REM sleep. The progression of these stages is called the sleep architecture. During sleep, virtually every part of the body undergoes changes in the brain, including the skin, eyelids, and heart rate. In addition, thousands of neurons in the brain are switched from waking to sleeping states, sending signals throughout the body.
