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Friday, March 17 will mark the 17^th edition of World Sleep Day, an opportunity to raise general public awareness of the health impact of sleep.

Sleep is essential to brain maturation and development. It also plays a fundamental role in metabolic functions, notably by regulating the production of several hormones.

Sleep quality is likely to have an impact on susceptibility to infection. Sleep is thought to help the immune system function and rebuild itself.

Chronic sleep deprivation could explain the increase in obesity and late-onset diabetes.

Lastly, insufficient sleep, or going to bed too late, affects adolescents by reducing the volume of gray matter in the brain, thus seriously compromising their academic performance, health, and safety.

 To help shed light on the impact sleep has on our health, a few examples of research conducted by Inserm teams are provided below, together with the contact details of selected researchers working in this field:

“Lack of sleep causes brain impairment in adolescents”, published on March 8, 2017.

 “Neurons paralyze us during REM sleep”, published on December 13, 2016.

“Narcolepsy-cataplexy, a sleep disorder, may have an autoimmune origin”, published on September 16, 2016.

“Sleep, a solution for immunity”, published on April 27, 2016.

Discover the “Sleep and sleep disorders” fact file on the Inserm website, and watch the PomBio à croquer video on “Sleep and metabolism”.