Sleeping more may not be the whole story. How efficiently a person sleeps may matter too, according to a new report of company research linking sleep patterns to belly fat and brain size. 14,031 adults
The report comes from Longevity.Technology. It describes research released by Prenuvo, a whole-body MRI company, working with sleep scientists at UT Dallas. This article is based on that report. The study itself was not reviewed.
According to Longevity.Technology's report, the team analysed whole-body MRI scans and sleep data from 14,031 adults. Sleep information came from intake questions based on the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, a widely used sleep questionnaire.
Per the report, higher sleep efficiency was associated with lower visceral fat. Sleep efficiency generally means how much of the time in bed is spent asleep. Visceral fat is the fat stored deep in the abdomen, around the organs. The report also says higher sleep efficiency was associated with greater parietal gray matter volume. The parietal region is part of the brain. Gray matter is the tissue that holds nerve cell bodies.
In the other finding, according to the report, sleeping more than eight hours was associated with smaller hippocampal volume. The hippocampus is a brain region involved in memory.
The analysis adjusted for age, sex, body mass index, scanner location and head size, according to the report. Adjusting means the researchers tried to account for those factors when comparing people.
Several points limit what can be taken from this. The findings are reported by the company. The coverage does not say whether they have been peer reviewed. It does not say how large the differences were.
An association also does not show cause. The coverage does not say whether poor sleep leads to more belly fat or smaller brain regions, or whether something else explains both. The coverage does not describe how the data were collected over time.
The question matters because sleep is often judged by hours alone. If quality tracks with body fat and brain structure in a way that hours do not, that could shift how researchers and clinicians think about measuring sleep. If the link fades in independent, peer-reviewed analysis, the simple hours-based view would stand.
According to the report, Prenuvo says the work draws on its Research Network and an imaging biobank of more than 200,000 scans. The company operates 26 clinics across North America, Australia and Europe.
Whether the full study is published in a peer-reviewed journal with effect sizes, and whether other groups find the same links.
Source: Longevity.Technology
Read the cited source: Source 1
Keep reading on this subject
Sleep & circadian rhythms · GLP-1 & metabolic health