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Really? Jet Lag May Cause Stupidity

A study presented November 15 at the annual Society for Neuroscience meeting finds that hamsters suffering extreme, chronic jet lag had about half the normal rate of new neuron birth in a part of the brain. What’s more, these animals showed deficits in learning and memory.

Jet lag poses a serious health threat, said study coauthor Erin Gibson of the University of California, Berkeley.

Studies have shown that people with work schedules that require them to frequently change their sleep patterns have higher rates of cardiovascular diseases, diabetes and cancer.

Jet lag decreases the numbers of new neurons being born in the hippocampus by about 50 percent, the team found.

Mental function suffered, too: The jet-lagged hamsters were worse at learning which of two chambers contained a desirable running wheel. Even after 28 days of a back-to-normal schedule, the formerly jet-lagged hamsters still showed learning and memory problems.

Source: Wired Science

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