Sleepless nights and disrupted body clocks could be linked to mental health conditions such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, according to research by Professor Russell Foster, University of Oxford, being presented to the public in Birmingham on 22 July.
Foster’s work suggests that the neural mechanisms of the brain behind mental health and normal sleep overlap and share brain circuits, so if your sleep is disrupted, so is your mental health. Studies of schizophrenia patients have found profound disruptions in their sleep patterns, with half also having irregular body clocks that are out of sync with the pattern of night and day.
Foster said, ‘The appalling sleep-wake in schizophrenia is independent of medication and social constraints. There is something fundamentally wrong with the body clock of patients with schizophrenia.
Foster’s team also identified a genetic mutation that triggers schizophrenia-like symptoms in mice, which also appears to disrupt their circadian rhythm or body clock.
Foster said, ‘We looked at a gene linked with schizophrenia in humans. When mutated, it completely smashes the mouse sleep-wake cycle, just like the patients we observe with schizophrenia. Here we have direct evidence of a genuine mechanistic overlap between the neural circuits that give rise to normal mental health and the neural circuits that give rise to normal sleep.’
The findings offer the potential to identify sleep disruptions early on and predict the arrival of mental illness. Sleep disruption may even be causing the onset of conditions such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.
Foster said, ‘We’ve been looking at young people at high risk of developing bipolar. They are already showing an abnormal sleep-wake pattern before any clinical diagnosis. Part of the reason patients with mental illness are so socially isolated is because they sleep during the day and are awake at night. If we can correct that, it may help social integration, and if we can correct some of the sleep-wake problems we may have a genuine and lasting effect on the patient’s mental health.’
Russell Foster will be delivering The Physiological Society’s Annual Public Lecture on body clocks at the International Union of Physiological Sciences (IUPS) Congress in Birmingham on 22 July 2013. www.iups.org
ENDS
Notes for Editors
Public lecture of The Physiological Society (free) at The IUPS Congress, The ICC, Birmingham, Monday 22 July 2013, 19:30 – 20:30
Russell Foster, University of Oxford: The Rhythms of Life – What your body clock means to you
New audio interview with Russell Foster on circadian rhythms and mental illness. Recorded in April 2013 and available to use – please contact Lucy Holmes (details below).
Congress of the International Union of Physiological Sciences (IUPS), 22-26 July, Birmingham
The congress will bring together over 3000 physiologists from all corners of the globe to attend over 100 symposia and 30 keynote lectures. The congress has been running since 1889 and was started in an effort to promote physiology, encourage the interchange of ideas, and afford physiologists the opportunity to know one another personally. www.iups2013.org
Contacts
Russell Foster, Professor of Circadian Neuroscience and Head of Department of Ophthalmology, University of Oxford
russell.foster@eye.ox.ac.uk; +44(0)1865 287831
Lucy Holmes, Media and Communications Officer, The Physiological Society
pressoffice@physoc.org, +44 (0)20 7269 5727