CIRCADIAN MENTAL HEALTH NETWORK
Projects
Helios-BD. Lithium's mechanism in bipolar disorder: Investigating the light hypersensitivity hypothesis
Lithium has been in use for 70 years and is the most effective treatment for bipolar disorder. It has many actions but the precise mechanism of action in bipolar disorder is uncertain. Recent evidence suggests that lithium may work by stabilizing aberrant circadian rhythms of mood, cognition and rest/activity, possibly via an action at the level of the retina.
AMBIENT-TEENS: Acquiring rich longitudinal passive sleep data across childhood and adolescence
This project will use a co-designed research approach, tailored across age 8-18, to develop and evaluate an innovative passive sleep data collection method that has the potential to be used at scale in future studies of adolescent health. Through our strong collaborative links with our industry partner Somnofy, we will evaluate the utility across adolescence of a new generation of methods that measures sleep using remote data capture.
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Better Sleep: NIHR Oxford Health Biomedical Research Centre
An interdisciplinary research team is being created to address sleep and circadian rhythms disorders with a particular focus on developing, testing and delivering scalable, cost-effective sleep and circadian interventions.
Developing and testing an intervention for Shift Work Sleep Disorder in NHS workers
Our research aims to develop and test ways to help NHS staff whose lives are severely disrupted because they work shifts. These treatments, which we call "interventions", will be based around changing people's behaviour to improve their sleep and wellbeing.
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AMBIENT-BD: Ambient and passive collection of sleep and circadian rhythm data in bipolar disorder to understand symptom trajectories and clinical outcomes
Using sleep and circadian rhythms data to understand trajectories and clinical outcomes in bipolar disorder. Our vision is to work closely with the bipolar disorder community in Scotland to optimise the use of innovative ambient and passive data collection methods for sleep and circadian rhythms. To inform future approaches early intervention, clinical practice and personalised medicine in bipolar disorder.
A pilot randomised control trial of sleep restriction therapy vs sleep hygiene education for newly diagnosed breast cancer patients with acute insomnia
Twenty percent of breast cancer survivors have insomnia, which is defined as persistent trouble falling and/or staying asleep that results in difficulty functioning during the day. Sleep difficulties often begin at cancer diagnosis, become worse during cancer treatment, and continue into cancer survivorship.
Determining the membrane circadian clock across evolution
The molecular clock consists of clock genes that switch themselves on and off every 24 hours in the clock neurons of the brain. In our '24/7 society', an increasing proportion of the population experience de-synchronisation of their circadian clock with the external world. This so-called 'social jetlag', like jetlag can contribute to an alarming increase in health risks, being associated with the mental health crisis, cancer, diabetes, addiction, metabolic and sleep disorders, with 30% of people experiencing insomnia.
