Too short, long sleep is risk of incurable lung disease, study

Studies in mice revealed that by altering the clock mechanism it was possible to disrupt the fibrotic process making the animals more likely to develop pulmonary fibrosis. The researchers then showed, that pulmonary fibrosis is associated with short and long sleep duration using human data from the UK Biobank. The link between sleep duration and lung fibrosis is similar in strength to other known risk factors for this disease.

People who report they regularly sleep four hours or less in a day doubled their chance of having pulmonary fibrosis while those sleeping 11 hours or longer in a day tripled their chance of having the disease, compared to those sleeping seven hours per day.

Smaller, but still elevated, risks were also seen in people who like to stay up late at night or those who do shift work. The researchers explain their findings by the discovery that a core clock protein (REVERBa) which alters the production of a key protein in lung fibrosis (collagen). This is an exciting finding, because chemical compounds can alter the function of REVERBa, said the researchers.

The researchers were able to show that one of these REVERBa compounds can reduce collagen in lung slices from people with this disease. The discovery that the clock plays a role in fibrosis suggests that altering these oscillations could become an important therapeutic approach, the research said.

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