Light and jetlag

How to overcome jetlag with the help of light?

The phenomenon called jetlag has been discussed since 1931. When people started with the first intercontinental flights, they experienced problems with falling and staying asleep, extreme sleepiness, decreased alertness and performance and somatic, gastrointestinal, problems as a consequence of the quick transition to other time zones. From that moment on more and more people experience this "jetlagsyndrome" because of ever increasing tourism and faster movement by airplane.

Chronobiology is the quantitative study of bioligical phenomena that change periodically. The daily rhythms that influence much of our behaviour, are called circadian rhythms (Latin: circa means approximately and dies means day). Many physiological phenomena in the human body show circadian changes, like the rhyttm of the body temperature and the performance. Another important biological rhythm is the sleep/wake cycle. The circadian rhythm is normally synchronised by periodically returning changes in the environment, like the light/dark cycle. When in a short time many time zones are crossed, the synchronisation can be disturbed, with various physical consequenses, like concentration disturbances, tiredness, sleeplessness, sleep disturbances, gastrointestinal complaints, headache, irritability, decreased performance. All the physical phenomena caused by the quick crossing of time zones is called jetlag.

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