Your body does important things while you sleep -- like healing your cells. But just one night of tossing and turning could trigger cell-damaging inflammation. So turn off the tube, slip on that sleep mask, and get your 40 winks.
Scientists at the University of Southern California (along with Italian researchers) report today that fasting for 48 hours before receiving chemotherapy could help limit the treatment's toxic effects to cancer cells—and spare healthy ones. The new finding may pave the way for higher and more frequent chemo doses that better shrink tumors without harming normal cells.
In a recent study, sleep-deprived people -- especially women -- showed a marked increase in their levels of a protein called NF-kB. That’s bad news, because NF-kB plays an essential role in the body’s inflammation response. The study may help explain why poor sleep is associated with several inflammation-related disorders, including cardiovascular disease, arthritis, diabetes, cancer, and obesity.
The technique stems from lessons learned during research on aging, according to Valter Longo, a U.S.C. gerontologist and co-author of the new study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA: When normal cells are starved, the body uses up stores of glucose and energy to keep them functioning; in response, the cells shift into survival mode, revving up repair mechanisms and protective processes to resist anything—including potentially fatal drugs—that threaten to damage their genetic material.
8 Hours to Healthier Cells
