SLEEP SECRETS

How scientists discovered the secrets of our sleep

This week: sleep deprivation IN 1896, American psychologists G. T. Patrick and J. A. Gilbert performed a landmark experiment on sleep deprivation by keeping three young men awake for 90 hours. They reported how their subjects suffered decreased attention span, memory and grip strength. One volunteer had visual hallucinations.

This was the first scientific study to establish how a single extended bout of sleeplessness would lead to significant mental and physical deficits. In 1983, a trial on rats at Chicago University’s Sleep Research Laboratory further revealed the horrors of constant sleep deprivation — all the rats died from sepsis within three weeks, reported the journal Science. This suggested that sleep deprivation lowers the immune system’s ability to fight infection. Subsequent studies have shown how sleep-deprived patients in intensive care units often succumb to sepsis.