New Hampshire Health News Digest

ScienceDaily: Extreme Personality Poses Risk Of ADHD, Conduct Disorder FSU psychology professors Jeanette Taylor and Chris Schatschneider, FSU doctoral student Kelly Cukrowicz and University of Minnesota Professor William Iacono found that children with ADHD or conduct disorder had more negative emotions - aggressiveness, tension and feelings of being exploited, unlucky or poorly treated - and lower constraints - a tendency to break rules and engage in thrill-seeking behavior - than children with neither of the disorders. Not surprisingly, those children who have both ADHD and conduct disorder had the most extreme personality profiles.

Scientists Discover Genes for Type-2 Diabetes Breakthrough could lead to personalized treatments for deadly illness in 15 to 20 years. February 12, 2007 By Marisa Taylor An international team of scientists has made an important genetic discovery that could lead to personalized treatments for type two-diabetes, an illness that can cause serious complications like heart disease, high blood pressure, and strokes. The scientists found mutations in four genes that appear to increase the likelihood of developing type-two diabetes. The researchers looked at the genetic variations of more than 400,000 genetic locales in 700 patients with type-two diabetes who also have a family history of the disease. Among their more notable discoveries was a variation on the eighth chromosome that seems to be responsible for the transport of zinc, a mineral that is needed for the production of insulin. “We know that the zinc transporter is very, very important for determining how sensitive your body is to i...

Welcome to Sun2Surf New genes point to diabetes risk WASHINGTON (Feb 12, 2007): Researchers said yesterday they had homed in on five areas of DNA that could account for 70% of the genetic risk for type-2 diabetes. They identified four different areas of genetic variation that conferred a significant risk of developing diabetes and confirmed that a fifth area, a gene called TCF7L2 suspected in diabetes, is associated with the disease. Writing in the journal Nature, the international team of researchers said their findings would help other scientists find causes and possible treatments for diabetes. They also said it showed it was useful to scan people's entire genomes to look for disease-causing genes. "Our new findings mean that we can create a good genetic test to predict people's risk of developing this type of diabetes," said Philippe Froguel of Imperial College London, who worked on the study. Type-2 or adult onset diabetes is becoming more and more common around ...

Hyper, or Hurting? If a child acts inattentive and hyperactive in school, chances are very good he (it’s usually a boy) will be diagnosed with ADHD. Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder affects an estimated 8-12 percent of children worldwide. The designation is so common it’s become a casual synonym for being scatterbrained (“I’m totally ADD today”), and its prevalence is self-propogating—the more people are aware of the disorder, the more likely they are to claim it as the cause of a problem. Beyond the overdiagnosis of kids who are hyper but healthy, there’s a graver consequence to this attention-deficit bandwagon. A small but growing body of research confirms what is, so far, a little-known fact—that the symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) can look exactly like those of ADHD. In other words, a distractible, impulsive irritable child who looks to a teacher or caregiver like a classic ADHD case may actually be struggling to cope with abuse, divorce, natural disaster, ...

ADDitude Magazine - For People Who Have AD/HD By Bob Seay AD/HD May Not Have Always Been a Disorder; Research indicates that traits may have contributed to the survival of early humans Thom Hartmann took a lot of flak when he proposed an evolutionary model of AD/HD. Now, researchers at the University of California, Irvine, have concluded that his controversial theory may well be correct. Researchers now believe that a gene variation associated with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (AD/HD) first appeared 10,000 to 40,000 years ago and was probably a significant advantage to the early humans who had it. In an article published in the January 8, 2002 edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, Dr. Robert K. Moyzis and other researchers speculate that early humans with AD/HD traits such as novelty-seeking, increased aggression and perseverance were more likely to survive. These traits have been associated with the DRD4 7R ...

Iraq: Jihadist Perspectives on a U.S. Withdrawal By Fred Burton Last week, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a nonbinding resolution to express disapproval of the president's plan to send more troops to Iraq. Republicans in the Senate prevented a similar resolution from coming to the floor for a vote the next day. The congressional actions come during a period of vigorous debate about U.S. involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan -- a debate that is being heavily fueled as presidential hopefuls from both parties begin to position themselves for the 2008 election. Naturally, this internal debate and media coverage have focused on the American perspective -- and, more specifically, on public opinion polls. But often missing in that discussion is the fact that Afghanistan and Iraq were not entered into as self-contained discrete wars, but as fronts in the wider U.S.-jihadist war. Therefore, though the Bush administration's troop strategy, the positioning of the Democrats and the...

Adult ADD / ADHD: Recognizing the Symptoms and Managing the Effects What are the signs and symptoms of adult ADD / ADHD? ADD / ADHD in adults can seriously impair work, finances, and relationships. Adults with ADD / ADHD may have the following symptoms of inattention and hyperactivity / impulsivity: not remembering being told something, "zoning out" in conversations, being late or forgetting to show up when expected, speaking without thinking, pressured rapid-fire speech, seemingly random, and aimless hopping from one topic to the next, perceived as aloof and arrogant, or tiresomely talkative and boorish, compulsive joking, often about personal life history and feelings, easily frustrated or bored, leaving a mess, procrastination (difficulty starting tasks), incompletions (starting tasks, household projects, or book reading, but not completing them before new projects or new books are begun, leaving a never-ending to-do list), underestimating the time needed to finish a task,...

Air Car Tantalisingly Close Celsias A French designer of engines for Formula One racing cars has turned his attention to creating an engine that runs on, and emits, only air! By all accounts, this is no pie-in-the-sky dream invention either - as the vehicle’s release is slated for later this year. With a top speed of 110kph (68mph) and a range of about 200kms (125miles), it looks to be an entirely useable commuter, and more. In fact, once the initial model is on the market, there are plans for a hybrid version - a car that will use a small amount of fuel to generate the compressed air required for the main engine - resulting in a 4,500km range (2,800 miles) from just one tank of fuel! That’s right - just compressed air! Because there is no ‘combustion’, the engine temperature remains tepid. This fact means the engine parts can be produced from metals with lower melting points, like aluminium - allowing for smaller lighter engines (about half the weight of a regular petrol engine) whi...

02/18/07 Coke > The Sunday Paper > News Archives There’s one in every office: the guy who’s smart, funny, interesting, creative and energetic—but also impulsive, chronically late and given to go on tangents in meetings. He’ll finish a report at the last minute, and it will be riddled with careless mistakes. That is, if he can find it on his messy desk to begin with. He’s probably an adult with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, according to William W. Dodson, a psychiatrist in private practice at the ADHD Treatment Center in Denver, Colo. “They make wonderful executives, but terrible secretaries,” says Dodson, who will present “The Truth About ADHD—Is It Affecting Your Life?” to Coca-Cola employees [...] An adult disorder, too Although ADHD is often perceived as an affliction of childhood, it is actually a lifelong disorder that affects more than 9 million adult Americans and is one of the most commonly diagnosed psychiatric disorders, Dodson says. Albert Einstein and Theo...

Good German Schools Come to America The Austrian famine of 1771-1772, combined with the increasingly brazen exploitation of children by mercantilists, led to a tense political situation for the ruling families of Austria and Prussia. Traditionally, peasants were kept in line by fear or threats of starvation. But the Austrian and Prussian governments' inability or unwillingness to move in the direction of any sort of social equality - combined with the desperation of famine and the theft of children - had pushed the populace to a dangerous level of anger. The old way of keeping the peasants in line didn't work: something new was necessary. [...] In 1756, Schlabrendorff suggested to Frederick II that a system of state-run, compulsory schools be established. Extraordinary benefits could come from it, which would be praised and echoed by German and Austrian philosophers, leaders, and educators (such as Fichte, Raab, Hitler, and others) for the next two hundred years: · By molding ...

Monkey's brain signals control 'third arm' - 13 October 2003 - New Scientist Monkeys can control a robot arm as naturally as their own limbs using only brain signals, a pioneering experiment has shown. The macaque monkeys could reach and grasp with the same precision as their own hand. "It's just as if they have a representation of a third arm," says project leader Miguel Nicolelis, at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. Experts believe the experiment's success bodes well for future devices for humans that are controlled solely by thought. One such type of device is a neurally-controlled prosthetic - a brain-controlled false limb. Nicolelis says his team's work is important because it has shown that prosthetics can only deliver precision movements if multiple parts of the brain are monitored and visual feedback is provided. Gerald Loeb, a biomedical engineer at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, says the new experiment already...

You may look thin  and be too fat | News | Health | Telegraph : "Research highlighting the danger of fat around vital organs could change the way we tackle obesity, reports Nic Fleming. MRI scans on four guinea pigs had surprising results [....] The team at the Medical Research Council's Clinical Sciences Centre has used a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanner at Hammersmith Hospital in London to map the fat distribution of 600 volunteers. Their results suggest that up to four in 10 people could be "tofi" – thin outside, fat inside. Previous research has shown someone with a lot of internal fat around the liver, gut, heart and pancreas, or streaked through under-used muscles, has a higher risk of heart disease, type 2 diabetes, hypertension and some cancers than someone with high levels of external fat." Cool pictures showing fat disribution

WWGWBD? Have to admit this is funny.

Al Qaeda Chiefs Are Seen to Regain Power - New York Times WASHINGTON, Feb. 18 — Senior leaders of Al Qaeda operating from Pakistan have re-established significant control over their once-battered worldwide terror network and over the past year have set up a band of training camps in the tribal regions near the Afghan border, according to American intelligence and counterterrorism officials. American officials said there was mounting evidence that Osama bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, had been steadily building an operations hub in the mountainous Pakistani tribal area of North Waziristan. Until recently, the Bush administration had described Mr. bin Laden and Mr. Zawahri as detached from their followers and cut off from operational control of Al Qaeda. The United States has also identified several new Qaeda compounds in North Waziristan, including one that officials said might be training operatives for strikes against targets beyond Afghanistan. American analysts said rece...

Jeff Hawkins hacks the human brain - February 1, 2007 The creator of the PalmPilot and the Treo isn't just making another gadget. He's attempting to fuse silicon and gray matter to produce the ultimate intelligent machine. Business 2.0 Magazine Erick Schonfeld, Business 2.0 Magazine editor-at-large February 7 2007: 6:15 PM EST (Business 2.0) -- Jeff Hawkins was just another junior engineer at Intel in 1979 when he stumbled across an issue of Scientific American magazine that would illuminate a path to what would become his life's work. It had nothing to do with the two great breakthroughs - the PalmPilot and the Treo - for which Hawkins would later become celebrated as one of the great technological and design geniuses of recent times. The issue was devoted to the human brain, and it featured an essay by DNA co-discoverer Francis Crick bemoaning the lack of a grand theory explaining how the roughly 3 pounds of gelatinous tissue each of us carries around in our skulls could ...

Google to rule the Earth : "Google to rule the Earth February 18th, 2007 @ 7:12 pm | Duncan Riley | 4 comments aiIn a speech Friday night to the Annual American Association for the Advancement of Science conference, Google co-founder Larry Page let slip with a truth we all suspected: “We have some people at Google [who] are really trying to build artificial intelligence (AI) and to do it on a large scale…It’s not as far off as people think.” Yep, you read that right, Google is trying to build real AI. The worlds most dominant online company, with the largest conglomeration of computing power the world has ever seen, is trying to build artificial intelligence, and according to Page it isn’t that far away either. The term Googlebot is about to take on a whole new meaning, and in the not to distant future as well. But Google is a good company, you may well say, after all Do No Evil is the company mantra. But true artificial intelligence not only has serious ethical and moral implicat...

YouTube - UNC PIT BREAKUP VIDEO HIGH QUALITY ( ANGLE 2 OF 2) UNC student breaks up with his girlfriend in front of 3000 people UNC student Ryan Burke found out his girlfriend was cheating on him. He planned out the entire event on Facebook. Roughly 3000 students showed up to see Ryan break up with his girlfriend on Valentine's Day in The Pit.

DrawerGeeks! What if real artists did THEIR interpretations of children's drawings of monsters? Find out! Very cool!

The Power of Makeup (Extreme Makeover) : "Click to view these girls after the makeover (you'll be surprised)"

Baghdad bombings, al-Qaeda and the insurgency (The Fourth Rail) Today's bombings in Baghdad bear the hallmarks of an al-Qaeda strike. The timing, target and mode of attack carry the signature of an al-Qaeda operation. The bombing also helps expose a fallacy of the recent National Intelligence Estimate, which claims al_Qaeda plays only a minor role in the insurgency. Timing: As the Associated Press notes, the attacks were coordinated on the very day of the anniversary of the Samarra bombing, where al-Qaeda destroyed the Golden Dome of the al-Askaria mosque, the most revered site in Shia Islam. The bombing kicked off a wave of sectarian violence which has threatened to plunge Iraq into civil war. But not only was the attack in Baghdad on the very day of the Samarra bombing, it was timed to occur "shortly after the government called for a 15-minute period of commemoration for the Feb. 22 Samarra bombing." Targets: Today's bombings, like several others over the past month...

Iranian sniper rifles in the hands of Iraqi insurgents (The Fourth Rail) Iranian sniper rifles in the hands of Iraqi insurgents The Telegraph reports a large quantity of Austrian made .50 caliber sniper rifles were seized in Baghdad The Steyr HS50 sniper rifle. Click photo to view. On the heals of a U.S. military presentation which provided evidence of Iranian made Explosively formed projectiles, mortars and other weapons being supplied to to Iraqi terrorists, as well as evidence of Iranian Qods Force operatives captured in Iraq, The Telegraph reports a significant quantity of Iranian owned sniper rifles have been seized in Iraq. Over twelve percent of Iran's Steyr HS50 sniper rifles purchased by the "National Iranian Police Organisation" in 2005 have been found inside Iraq. The Telegraph's Thomas Harding reports: More than 100 of the .50 calibre weapons, capable of penetrating body armour, have been discovered by American troops during raids. The guns were part of a ...

Stanley Kurtz on The Enemy at Home on National Review Online For the greater part of human history, almost every society has been structured around the bonds of marriage and kinship. A man’s security, health, prosperity, and religious standing all traditionally depended on his relatives. We moderns continue to marry and trace our descent through our parents, especially our fathers. Yet in comparison to societies in other times and places, the bonds of kinship are now thin and watery things. Marriage and the Terror War, Part II 02/16 Marriage and the Terror War 02/15 War of Cultures 02/14 Angry Talk 01/02 Doves Fly Toward Iran 11/13 Marriage Wins 11/08 Novak: Gambling on Defeat Lopez: Good for McCain Buckley: So Help Us Darwin Zalenski: February 18, 2007 Symposium: Presidential Considerations Canto: The Dangerfield Economy Seasholes: Free the Eagle Boyles: Lovelorn Norman: Yore Cheating Heart Nugent: Still Mystified by Money and Inflation Suderman: Bad Check Wittig: Days of Gl...

Stanley Kurtz on The Enemy at Home on National Review Online Short Course in Kinship In the late nineteenth century, British anthropologist Sir Edward Tylor developed the founding insight of the modern study of kinship. Tylor cited exogamy, or “marrying out,” as the key to human social progress. In Tylor’s scenario, early human groups, in danger of killing each other off through inveterate competition, discovered intermarriage as the path to social peace. Women who were related to one clan as sisters and to another clan as wives tended to discourage feuds between otherwise competing groups. As Tylor famously put it: “Again and again in the world’s history, savage tribes must have had plainly before their minds the simple practical alternative between marrying-out and being killed out.” And for Tylor, “cross cousin marriage,” a particular form of cousin marriage favored by many “primitive” societies, was the earliest and most fundamental form of clan exogamy — or “marrying out.” So what...

Driver’s License Emerges as Crime-Fighting Tool, but Privacy Advocates Worry - New York Times BOSTON, Feb. 12 — On the second floor of a state office building here, upstairs from a food court, three facial-recognition specialists are revolutionizing American law enforcement. They work for the Massachusetts motor vehicles department. Last year they tried an experiment, for sport. Using computerized biometric technology, they ran a mug shot from the Web site of “America’s Most Wanted,” the Fox Network television show, against the state’s database of nine million digital driver’s license photographs. The computer found a match. A man who looked very much like Robert Howell, the fugitive in the mug shot, had a Massachusetts driver’s license under another name. Mr. Howell was wanted in Massachusetts on rape charges. The analysts passed that tip along to the police, who tracked him down to New York City, where he was receiving welfare benefits under the alias on the driver’s license. Mr. How...

Ch�vez Threatens to Jail Price Control Violators - New York Times The economy grew by more than 10 percent last year, helping Mr. Chávez glide to a re-election victory in December with 63 percent of the vote. Yet economists who have worked with Mr. Chávez’s government say that soaring public spending is overheating Venezuela’s economy, generating imbalances in the distribution of products from sugar to basic construction materials like wallboard. Public spending grew last year by more than 50 percent and has more than doubled since the start of 2004, as Mr. Chávez has channeled oil revenues into social programs and projects like bridges, highways, trains, subways, museums and, in a departure for a country where baseball reigns supreme, soccer stadiums. In an indicator of concern with Mr. Chávez’s economic policies, which included nationalizing companies in the telephone and electricity industries, foreign direct investment was negative in the first nine months of 2006. The last year Ve...

Ch�vez Threatens to Jail Price Control Violators - New York Times CARACAS, Venezuela, Feb. 16 — Faced with an accelerating inflation rate and shortages of basic foods like beef, chicken and milk, President Hugo Chávez has threatened to jail grocery store owners and nationalize their businesses if they violate the country’s expanding price controls. Food producers and economists say the measures announced late Thursday night, which include removing three zeroes from the denomination of Venezuela’s currency, are likely to backfire and generate even more acute shortages and higher prices for consumers. Inflation climbed to an annual rate of 18.4 percent a year in January, the highest in Latin America and far above the official target of 10 to 12 percent. Mr. Chávez, whose leftist populism remains highly popular among Venezuela’s poor and working classes, seemed unfazed by criticism of his policies. Appearing live on national television, he called for the creation of “committees of social ...

Bloomberg Printer-Friendly Page Feb. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Venezuela President Hugo Chavez's plan to curb inflation by lopping three zeros from the currency may backfire because the move fails to address production bottlenecks that are pushing prices higher, economists said. The government will cut three zeros from the bolivar's exchange rate by February 2008, Chavez said last night in a televised speech, citing rising consumer prices. He also will cut the value-added tax rate and clamp down on ``speculators'' to halt last month's 4 percent increase in the cost of food. The steps aimed at slowing inflation and boosting local output miss the root causes exacerbating imbalances in South America's third-biggest economy, according to economists at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Bear Stearns & Co. Flush with oil money and government spending, which jumped about 50 percent last year, economic growth and inflation are both surging. ``He has a funny understanding of the p...

Karbala provincial headquarters raid - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia The raid of the Karbala provincial headquarters was an infiltration attack carried out on 20 January 2007 by insurgent commandos, with possible Iranian involvement, on a meeting of U.S. and Iraqi officials at the governor's compound in Karbala to discuss security for the Shia ceremony of Ashoura. The assault, which left five American soldiers dead and three wounded, has been called the "boldest and most sophisticated attack in four years of warfare"[2] and is furthermore notable for being one of the few instances when Iraqi militants have managed to capture U.S. soldiers. [...] The raid The attack was perpetrated by "nine to 12 militants posing as an American security team ... [who] traveled in black GMC Suburban vehicles — the type used by U.S. government convoys — had American weapons, wore new U.S. military combat fatigues, and spoke English."[4] According to one Iraqi official, the milit...

Iran's elite and mysterious fighters - Los Angeles Times The Revolutionary Guard was entrusted to protect Khomeini's theocracy. But the revolutionaries also were inspired to spread their vision abroad. The Quds Force and its predecessors consisted of the Guard's most skilled warriors. Experts said they were highly secretive commando units sent abroad to help Shiites usurp monarchies in the Persian Gulf, gun down enemies and battle Israeli forces in southern Lebanon. They also reportedly have run operations in Sudan, South Asia and Western Europe. Their plans sometimes coincided with U.S. interests, as when they supported Afghans fighting the Soviet Union in the 1980s and Bosnian Muslims battling Serbs in the 1990s. The Quds Force also has been involved in Iraq. It assisted Kurdish rebels fighting Saddam Hussein in the 1980s and Shiites battling his regime in the 1990s. Even Ahmad Chalabi's expatriate Iraqi National Congress had Quds Force help, experts say. At most, the...

Why are the Iranian bombs marked in English? - By Lindsay Goldwert - Slate Magazine Last week, U.S. military officials accused Iran of arming Iraqi insurgents with bombs, missiles, and rockets for attacks on American troops. Apparently, serial numbers and markings on seized munitions indicate they came from Iran. (Click here for a PDF of the U.S. military intelligence report.) Why do bombs need serial numbers? For inventory and quality control. When a bullet, explosive, or any kind of ammunition is manufactured, it may be marked with a unique serial number and the date of manufacture. (A bomb may also include information indicating which factory produced it.) This information simplifies the process of tracking missing or damaged munitions. For example, if a bullet misfires, the military can use its markings to identify and scrap the entire lot it came from. The date of manufacture is important because the components in ammunition begin to degrade and become unreliable after about 15 ye...

Liz Cheney - Retreat Isn't an Option - washingtonpost.com Sen. Hillary Clinton declared this weekend, " I'm in to win." Anyone who has watched her remarkable trajectory can have no doubt that she'll do whatever it takes to win the presidency. I wish she felt the same way about the war. In fairness, Clinton, with her proposal for arbitrary caps on troop levels and hemming and hawing about her vote for the war resolution, has company on both sides of the aisle. Sen. Joseph Lieberman is the only national Democrat showing any courage on this issue. We Republicans -- with help from senators such as Chuck Hagel -- seem ready to race the Democrats to the bottom. [..] I'd like to ask the politicians in both parties who are heading for the hills to stop and reflect on these basic facts: · We are at war. America faces an existential threat. This is not, as Speaker Nancy Pelosi has claimed, a "situation to be solved." It would be nice if we could wake up tomorr...

The Sun Online - Bizarre: Cruise 'is Christ' of Scientology TOM Cruise is the new “Christ” of Scientology, according to leaders of the cult-like religion. The Mission: Impossible star has been told he has been “chosen” to spread the word of his faith throughout the world. And leader David Miscavige believes that in future, Cruise, 44, will be worshipped like Jesus for his work to raise awareness of the religion. A source close to the actor, who has risen to one of the church’s top levels, said: “Tom has been told he is Scientology’s Christ-like figure. “Like Christ, he’s been criticised for his views. But future generations will realise he was right.” Cruise joined the Church of Scientology in the ’80s. Leader L Ron Hubbard claimed humans bear traces of an ancient alien civilisation.

Exploring Google's Hidden Features Google is a great search engine, but it's also more than that. Google has tons of hidden features, some of which are quite fun and most of which are extremely useful— if you know about them. How do you discover all these hidden features within the Google site? Read on to learn more. I love Google, and I love finding google hacks like these here!

Top Web tools for College Students - NextPath Top Web Tools for College Students I have been in college almost three years now and have been using many different Web tools that saved me time, helped me learn more and, most importantly, did not cost a penny. Here are 10 tools that I recommend for every college student:

13 Things I Wish I Learned In College - NextPath 13 Things I Wish I Learned In College College is a great experience that millions of students look forward to every year. I myself have been in college for a total of 6 years and have obtained a B.A. in communications as well as a MBA. After attending college I started working and realized that college does not prepare you for the real world. Here are some of the things that I should have learned in college so I would have been more prepared for my job after college.

Washington inaugurates new dollar coin series Dollar coins have gone clunk with the American public, but maybe that's about to change. Today, the U.S. Mint is issuing a gold-color "Presidential Dollar" coin that it hopes will appeal to collectors and consumers, unlike the wallflower Sacagawea and Susan B. Anthony dollar coins. Edmund Moy, director of the U.S. Mint, said the relentless pace of inflation means the time is ripe for a higher-denomination coin. "A quarter doesn't buy a whole lot in a parking meter anymore," he said. "You've got to carry a sack of quarters around to plug that meter. Laundry, car washes are very coin-intensive services." Weighing 8.1 grams, the same as the Sacagawea, a Presidential Dollar is lighter than four quarters, which weigh 5.5 grams each. But Moy thinks a bigger plus for the new dollars is their novelty. He hopes they will, ahem, mint a new generation of amateur numismatists. The Mint will issue the coins as a...

Carbs May Help You Fall Asleep Faster, Study Shows Biggest Benefit Comes From Starchy Carbohydrates Eaten Four Hours Before Sleep - CBS News (WebMD) To fall asleep faster, you might want to consider eating starchy carbohydrates before bedtime. That's according to an Australian study published in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. Carbs that quickly raise blood sugar (those with a high glycemic index) may hasten sleep, especially when eaten four hours before bedtime, the researchers report. Such carbs may boost tryptophan and serotonin, two brain chemicals involved in sleep, the study suggests.