Students track sleep patterns with space-age watches

Students in Sheila Whelan's Adaptations to Physiology course have found that they
share more than just an interest in space with certain astronauts.

As part of their class, which explores the effects of, among other things,
weightlessness on the body, the students have been wearing Actiwatches. The small
device, which straps to the wrist like a watch, measures the amount of ambient light
the students are exposed to as well as the amount of activity they engage in.

Originally developed to study the effects of space travel on astronauts' sleep cycles, the
Actiwatches have provided students with unique insights into their own slumber habits
– and the results show that students, like astronauts, tend to be somewhat sleep
deprived.

“Some nights I only slept three hours because I had been up all night working on an
essay or studying,” said Beverley Preater, who spent a week wearing the watch earlier in
the year. “I'm a student, so I guess it wasn't that surprising.”

According to Whelan, the exercise helps students understand the theoretical concepts
they learn in class by applying them in everyday life.

“Wearing the Actiwatches helps the students better relate to the research because it's
their own bodies they're studying,” she said. “The data collected from the watches
really show just how important sleep is, whether you're an astronaut or a student. It
impacts everything from memory retention to cognitive function – that's really the
lesson here.”

After hearing from guest speakers such as Canadian astronaut and professor of
surgery Dave Williams, the students learned that astronauts can also have trouble
sleeping in space – though their sleeplessness tends to be a result of changes in
exposure to light, uncomfortable sleeping positions and even difficulty looking away
from the beauty that is Earth from afar rather than late-night cramming for exams.

Williams himself has experienced the effects of space travel on his body. In a 2009
interview with Canada AM, he described being “gravitationally-challenged” upon his
return from space flights, and he continues to be monitored by NASA doctors seeking
to understand the long-term effects of space on the human body.