Why a midnight snack could raise risk of sunburn

EATING late at night should be avoided if you plan on sunbathing the next day, research has suggested.

A study found that the skin has a biological clock which can be disrupted by latenight snacking, leaving it less able to repair itself from damage caused by the sun.

Levels of a natural chemical which helps skin to heal were found to be lower when meal times were out of sync, according to a study by the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Centre.

The study showed that mice which were given food during the day – an abnormal eating time for the nocturnal animals – sustained more skin damage from ultraviolet light than mice that ate only at night. This occurred, at least in part, because an enzyme that repairs UV-damaged skin shifted its daily cycle in response.

Neuroscientist Dr Joseph Takahashi, who carried out the research, said: ‘This finding is surprising. I did not think the skin was paying attention to when we are eating.’

He added: ‘If you have an abnormal eating schedule, that could cause a harmful shift in your skin clock, like it did in the mice.’ Previous studies have demonstrated strong roles for the body’s circadian rhythms in skin biology. However, little had been understood about what controls the skin’s daily clock.

In the research, published in the journal Cell Reports, scientists studied the influence of meal timing because it had already been known to affect the daily cycles of metabolic organs such as the liver.