Description Of A Circadian Rhythm - 1590 Words

A circadian rhythm is a 24 hour cycle in the physiological processes of living beings, including plants, animals, fungi and cyanobacteria. Although they are endogenously generated, they respond to external stimuli such as sunlight and temperature. Circadian rhythms are important in determining the sleeping and feeding patterns of all animals, including humans. In humans, the 24 hour cycle is centered within the hypothalamus, which uses certain cells within the retina of the eye to detect the level of brightness all around; these cells are called photosensitive retinal ganglion cells or pRGCs. PRGCs send collected information through the optic nerve to the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN), the brain’s master clock; which coordinates smaller body clocks that govern the behavior of cells throughout the body. The suprachiasmatic nuclei is a tiny patch of around 200,000 neurons. Nearly every cell in the human body keeps time by its own means; they keep time locally, helping them figur e out when to use energy, rest, repair DNA, or replicate. Taking light as its cue, the master clock determines a continuous cycle of physiological change within cells; this includes the production of hormones that prepare the human body for waking and sleeping hours. â€Å"Interestingly, animals, including humans, kept in total darkness for extended periods eventually function with a free-running rhythm. Their sleep cycle is pushed back or forward each â€Å"day†, depending on whether their â€Å"day†, is shorter orShow MoreRelatedEssay on importance of sleep979 Words   |  4 Pagesstates, non-REM and REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep. Sleep is characterized by two distinct states, non-REM sleep and REM sleep. Non-REM and REM sleep alternate in 90- to 110-minute cycles. A normal sleep pattern has 4-5 cycles. The diagram and descriptions below illustrate the architecture of sleep. This explains why the cycles of sleep have been compared to going up and down a stairway. The five-step sleep cycle repeats itself throughout a night of sleeping, much like a roller coaster. As a personRead MoreThe Health Benefits Of Sleep1651 Words   |  7 Pagesthe world to sleep, we become numb, deaf and inattentive of our inner selves. There s always a certain time in the night that our body is perfectly telling us to sleep because we are in tune with the nature’s cycle of life and of the earth’s circadian rhythms or relating to biological processes occurring at 24-hour intervals and that is our innate body clock, but we often ignore it because of all unfinished tasks, duties, businesses, chores and every satisfying act of making something happen throughRead MoreEssay on Body Temp and Reaction Time1848 Words   |  8 Pagesend of the project description. READ THE RUBRIC COMPLETELY BEFORE BEGINNING THIS PROJECT! Introduction: In order to stay healthy and to function efficiently, living things must coordinate their internal processes with the external world. The most obvious feature of our environment that most creatures have to respond to is the daily cycle of light and dark. Biological processes that follow this 24-hour cycle, such as our sleep-wake cycle, are said to follow a circadian rhythm. One of the best-knownRead More D. Virginiana (Didelphis Marsupialis) Essay2436 Words   |  10 PagesD. Virginiana (Didelphis Marsupialis) The text of this paper will cover a description of D. virginiana, its ecology, history, and research involving the species. The first topic to be discussed by this paper is a description of D. virginiana, which was until recently referred to as Didelphis marsupialis. The description of the opossum will start with a taxonomic description of the species. 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According to Richard’s descriptions, she is an authoritarian Seventh-Day Adventist who refers to literary works of fiction as â€Å"Devil stuff.† His maternal grandmother even went as far as to vociferate at Richard, telling him that he was â€Å"going to burn in hell.† Undoubtedly, RichardRead MoreSleep Is The Best Meditation Essay1561 Words   |  7 Pagesreliable and valid data. Works that were excluded were mainly ones that did not provide relevant information pertaining to the specific aims of the project, were not written in English, only studied one insomnia subtype, or were only focused on the circadian rhythm (Edinger et al., 2004). Of the 433 article s reviewed, only 165 were retained for data extraction. The bulk of those articles were group comparisons, case series - descriptive, and case reports. The samples contained in the selected articles provided