Ask any frequent flyer and they'll happily inform you that high on the list of their pet peeves is the threat of persistent jet lag after a long international flight.For Australians, jetlag is a constant reminder of the vast distances that stretch between our southern shores and the rest of the world.
That's why we're very interested in the work of two Boston sleep researchers whom appear to have deciphered the jetlag puzzle using math and software.
According to an enlightening New Science report, Boston pair Dennis Dean and Elizabeth KIerman from Brigham and Women's Hospital in the North Eastern US state have studied the effects of jetlag on the body by replicating the effects of disrupted sleep patterns in the lab.
The study involved hundreds of volunteers over a two month period, using 'timed light' therapy to help work out when the body should sleep and when it should stay awake and by adding light in a closed room to vary this 'light intensity'.
In the past, many travellers have had their own home remedies to defeat jet lag, ranging from staying up all night to taking your socks off on the plane and wiggling your toes.
Now comes a more scientific method, with the results contained in a handy piece of software (in beta mode) to help travellers better understand their own body's sleep cycle.
But, what's most interesting about this research isn't how the researchers addressed the effects of circadian rhythms using math (as the article states, it's been done before), but how the scientists turned to light hacking, a process by which light therapy is used in the lab to replicate the effects of natural sunlight on the body.
The key to our sleep, say sleep researchers, lies (if you will excuse the pun) in understanding the fundamental importance of the body's circadian rhythms and its relation to the amount of light we receive.
Under cabin pressure environments when we fly, our regular source of natural light is cut off. And as multiple time zones are criss-crossed, our brain and our rhythms can rapidly become distorted, ultimately affecting our innate sleep cycle.
It's hoped that the software (download it here) will give frequent flyers a chance to overcome the effects of jetlag naturally without the need to resort to unproven pseudoscience remedies.