[Science Report]:Jet Lag and the Brain


This is the VOA SpecialEnglish Science Report.

A new study says one part of the human brain may become smalleras the result of a condition known as jet lag. Jet lag results fromflying long distances in an airplane. Jet lag interferes with aperson's normal times for sleeping and waking. People with jet lagmay feel extremely tired for several days. They also may haveproblems thinking clearly and remembering.

Kwangwook Cho is a researcher at the University of Bristol inBritain. He reported the findings of his jet lag study in thepublication Nature Neuroscience.

The study involved twenty young women who worked forinternational airlines. The women had served passengers on airplanesfor five years. These flight attendants flew across many countriesand at least seven time zones.

In the study, the flight attendants had different amounts of timeto recover from jet lag. Half the women spent five days or fewer intheir home areas between long flights. The other half spent morethan fourteen days in their home areas.

Mister Cho took some fluid from the women's mouths to measurelevels of a hormone that increases during stress. He tested them tosee if they could remember where black spots appeared on a computerscreen. And he took pictures of their brains using magneticresonance imaging. This is a way to measure the size of the brain'stemporal lobes.

Mister Cho found that the women who had less time between flightshad smaller right temporal lobes. This area of the brain deals withrecognizing and remembering what is seen. The same group performedworse and had slower reaction times on the visual memory test. Andtheir saliva samples showed higher levels of stress hormones.

Mister Cho says he believes the brain needs at least ten days torecover after a long trip. He says airline workers told him theirability to remember got worse after working on planes for about fouryears. Other studies have shown that increased feelings of stresscan cause a loss of cells in the part of the brain that controlsmemory.

Scientists say more tests are needed to study the effects of jetlag on the brain. They want to find out if too much jet lag couldpermanently affect memory.

This VOA Special English Science Report was written by NancySteinbach.

品牌培训机构展示

该专题下最近更新的节目

专题广播资料索引