Sleep cycle alarm clock4

Here’s some great science for you folks. This iPhone app tracks your movement throughout the night, which differs based on the cycle of sleep you’re in, and uses that to calculate the optimal time to wake you up. I heard about it. I considered it. I realized it would work because I am spending lots of money to learn SCIENCE! And then I decided to file it away in case I ever get an iPod Touch.

        Then I waited a few days and decided to write a tumblr post about it.

        There’s plenty of stuff on their site, and in this review, about how it “works” in terms of the waking you up bit, but none of these have explained the coolest part - how the hell does it work? Here’s the thing - when you’re in the deepest stage of sleep, REM, your body is basically paralysed. Maybe so you don’t act out your dreams or something. At any rate, should you wake up during REM sleep, you’ll feel awful. You cycle through the five stages of sleep in around 90 minutes, so the alarm has a 30 minute leeway before your scheduled awakening to wake you up. If you enter the lightest stage of sleep in that period, it wakes you up. If you’re in REM, it’ll wait for you to pass out of it.

        Gosh, isn’t science fun!?

        Also cool are dawn simulators. Yet another thing from Lifehacker, this site allegedly has a good dawn simulator for $40. Or they would if they weren’t sold out until january 2011. I know it looks horrible, but it probably is legit, all things considered. Just bad web design. If you’re too lazy to read the page: “slowly lights a bedside lamp to simulate dawn. This simulates sunrise and tells your brain that it is time to get up and start the day.” So I guess you plug your lamp into it or whatever which is why it’s not big and fancy.

        I’m kinda tempted by the 205 model though, for $20. Couldn’t hurt. It actually does suck waking up to complete darkness. But. Eh. We’ll see.

        edit for bonus SCIENCE!: The dawn simulator isn’t strictly a light-based alarm clock, rather it’s meant to keep your biological clock ticking properly, which is what leads to Seasonal Affective Disorder Syndrome. AKA you get depressed during the winter because light hitting your retinas makes your body secrete melatonin, which gets your body going for the day - and winter is dark so you don’t get that. Thus the dawn simulator, which serves to get your body producing melatonin at the right time and prime you for waking up.

        This also extends to light getting to your eyes before sleep - it’ll keep your brain from knowing it’s night time and that you need to sleep, getting you all out of whack. So keep your monitor brightness down and stuff.