I wrote the following article for the Circadian Sleep Disorders Network:
On June 8 through the 12, the 2019 SLEEP Conference, the annual meeting of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM) and the Sleep Research Society (SRS), was held in San Antonio, TX.
The 4-day conference presented and discussed the latest developments in clinical sleep medicine, and sleep and circadian research.
There were more than 100 sessions, with 24 focused on circadian rhythms - a substantial increase from just a few years ago.
UCSF (University of California San Francisco) researcher Dr. Louis Ptacek, a pioneer in establishing genetic studies for sleep behavior, discussed his research on humans, fruit flies, and mice, probing the biology regulating the body clock and sleep.
Dr. Phyllis Zee of Northwestern University spoke about the impact circadian rhythms have on weight gain for children and adults. A new study finds that light exposure overnight during sleep has been shown to influence metabolism and highlighted the importance that properly timed light be considered as part of a healthy lifestyle. Zee also discussed important advances that were made this year in terms of blood testing to identify gene expression to determine circadian timing.
California State Senator Anthony Portantino received an AASM award for his work developing public policy that moves school start times later so students get adequate sleep. His bill, SB-328, Pupil attendance: school start time, would require the school day for middle schools and high schools in CA to begin no earlier than 8:30 a.m.
Other hot topics included how essential proper sleep is to mental health, if cannabis is effective for improving sleep and the need for standards for measuring sleep cycles with wearables.
