A research program in the US at The University of Columbia has come to the conclusion that good and satisfying sleep and weight loss could go hand in hand. The scientists say that it may be the case that good sleep may be on a par with diet and exercise when considering weight loss methods. The results at Columbia University showed that the participants that slept 4 hrs or less each night had more than a seventy percent chance of suffering from obesity compared to the participants who were sleeping between 7 and 9 hours each night.

Being awake more, gives one the abilty to eat more and have late night snacks as well, but the lack of sleep also causes eating behaviour to change along with appetite. It was also noted that lack of sleep may result in poor energy levels which people then compensate for with extra eating more meals a day. A lead sleep researcher, was of the opinion that we actually want unhealthy foods with fat or sugar when we are fatigued by lack of sleep.

Another factor of sleep is that when we are sleeping, hormones designed to boost growth are activated. In tests it was found that people who had poor levels of sleep had lower amounts of leptin and cortisol, two essential compounds for healthy bodies. Lower levels of leptin in the human body means the brain signals the to the stomach that it is still hungry when in fact it is not. The other compound cortisol is a blood glucose regulator and incorrect levels of cortisol also feed false infornation to the body.

In another sleep and obesity clinical test a group of one hundred overweight men who suffer from sleep apnea were evaluated. The men were asked to exercise, consume low calorie diets long with the appetite supressant drug Reductil (sibutramine). The results showed that those people who lost ten percent of body mass also gained a thirty percent loss in their sleep apnea. The scientists were not able to definetely pinpoint the cause of this but said that the loss of excess fat near the windpipes and general lack of effort required to breathe could be the reasons for the better sleep.

Reports of a very rare sleeping disorder, where patients "sleep walk" in the night for food binges and then are unaware of them in the morning is the reason for the tiredness of individuals that have sudden and unexpected weight rises. This wierd sleep disorder is reported very rarely, but further research on it could lead to more infromation about the connection between sleep patterns and food and diet.