quote:If you woke up feeling groggy this morning and found yourself humming ''I Don't Like Mondays" on the way to work, a Rhode Island start-up may have a new technology that's a better solution than a grande cappuccino.
Axon Sleep Research Laboratories is developing a headband called SleepSmart that you'd wear overnight. Rather than waking you up at a precise time -- say, 6:30 a.m. -- the headband would monitor your brain waves using special sensors, and wake you up sometime in the half-hour leading up to 6:30 when you were in a light phase of sleep, which is preferable to being jolted out of deep sleep.
''Even if you're getting a limited amount of sleep," says Eric Shashoua, Axon's president, ''it can still make a significant improvement on your morning."
Sounds even better than that sunrise alarm clock. Or, even better, it could be combined with the sunrise alarm clock.
Dagonee
Posted by Farmgirl (Member # 5567) on :
What if you weren't ever in the "light sleep stage" in the half hour prior to your normal alarm time?
My middle son has trouble with sleep stages - he kind of goes directly to the deep level 4 and just stays there and doesn't cycle up and down through the levels like bodies are supposed to.
Farmgirl
Posted by ElJay (Member # 6358) on :
Does it have a radio transmiter, too, so I can monitor your brainwaves?
*curious
Posted by Mike (Member # 55) on :
Whoa. I know the guy who started this company. Used to juggle with him at Brown.
Posted by Jay (Member # 5786) on :
You have to wear a headband? Man… that would keep me up. Why can’t it just scan ya….
Posted by KarlEd (Member # 571) on :
quote: Does it have a radio transmiter, too, so I can monitor your brainwaves?
Actually it does, but it scrambles the data and transmits it back to the parent company. They're offering these things in goodie bags to be handed out at the next Fortune 500 meeting, UN General Assembly, and to each Senator, Representative, and Presidential Cabinet member. Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Jim Carrey is the CEO, and Tommy Lee Jones is the muscle.
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
Or what if, like me, you frequently wake up at some point during the half hour before your alarm is set to go off, look at the clock, think "aah, I've still got 20 minutes!" and turn over and go back to sleep?
Farmgirl, that's really interesting about your son not experiencing any of the sleep stages other than stage 4. How do you know this? Have you taken him to a sleep clinic or something?
Posted by Farmgirl (Member # 5567) on :
Yeah - it was several years ago when he was having trouble with enuresis for many more years that most kids of that age. It was determined that he was having trouble "fully waking up" because he wasn't going through the sleep cycles...
Don't know if it has improved since then or not. He is my night-owl - wanders around the house until 2 or 3 AM, then finally crashes and sleeps till noon or so. He will definately have to have a second shift job.
Farmgirl
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
That's fascinating.
Does he dream? I know I've read that the idea that we only dream during REM sleep is a myth, but still, if he's so atypical in this it occurs to me he might not. Which would be the most interesting thing I've heard in ages.
Did the people at the sleep clinic say how common this kind of thing is?
Posted by quidscribis (Member # 5124) on :
Back when my sleep disorders were in full swing, I didn't dream. At all. For decades.
Hmm. Looks like something I'd love to try. It could be really good for me.
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
What effect did that have on you quid? I've read that people denied the opportunity to dream go insane, but unless you just got better you'd seem to be living proof that that's not the case.
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