It’s like the saying goes. When you come to college, time permits only two out of the three activities: sleep, study or a social life. Sleep, according to researchers, is clearly taking the back burner among college students.

In a recent study conducted at the University of St. Thomas in Minn. and released by the Journal of Adolescent Health, 70 percent of college students receive less than the eight recommended hours of sleep, choosing to engage in other activities. Parties, late night study sessions or job-related obligations are taking precedence and leaving less time for the mandatory sleep needed for optimal performance.

“It seems impossible to juggle a social life and academics and simultaneously get enough sleep,” said sophomore English and Spanish double major Abigail Mendoza. “We spend all day in class, or at internships or at our jobs; the only time left to be productive is in the middle of the night.”

Stress related factors additionally play a large role in college student sleep deprivation. The study, conducted on 1,125 students, found that 68 percent have trouble falling asleep due to academic and emotional stress, resulting in later bedtimes. These statistics reveal that stress has a much more significant impact on sleep quality than other factors, such as alcohol consumption or late night electronic usage.

“While some stress is useful and even healthy, frequent and chronic stress can take a toll,” said Counseling and Psychological Services’ pre-doctoral intern Katherine Leinberger. “It can take some skill to recognize when the stress scale has tipped. Stress is expressed somatically, and as a result, a somatic consequence includes insomnia. At the end of the day, timeless safeguards against stress include sleep and effective time management.”

Whether alarming rates of sleep deprivation among adolescents ages 17 to 24 are due to stress related factors or simply allocating time to other activities, poor sleep quality is leading to maladaptive outcomes, especially in the classroom. The same study revealed that sleep deprived college students became increasingly likely to miss class; 12 percent of poor sleepers miss or fall asleep in class three or more times a month.

During a normal school week, 20 percent of students pull all-nighters at least once a month and 35 percent stay up until 3 a.m. at least once a week.

A developing concern among researchers has been the correlation between increasingly poor sleep quality and the dependency on over-the-counter drugs and other sleep aids. Those college students with unhealthy sleep patterns are twice as likely to use alcohol and other drugs as sleep inducers.

“I usually will smoke weed every night because it has become the only way that I can fall asleep at night,” said a UC Davis student who requested to remain anonymous. “It’s also a motivator for me to do work. I’ll tell myself that if I work on academics for a straight two hours, then I can smoke weed and go to sleep.”

Researchers have attempted to attribute other factors to college students’ lack of sleep, one of them being the effects of the computer screen. According to a study done at the John Hopkins Sleep Disorders Center, the bright light of a computer screen can alter the body’s biological clock and suppress the natural production of melatonin, a hormone in the body that regulates sleeping and waking hours.

“Nowadays, there are lots of environmental issues that play a role in altering sleep patterns, and the most obvious would be the computer,” said Dr. Nancy Collop, medical director of the Sleep Disorders Center in a press release. “It emits a blue light, which is one of the most stimulating lights to the receptors we have in the back of our eyeballs; it sends a message to the brain on whether it’s day or night, and whether we should be awake or asleep.”

Despite varying explanations for college students’ sleep deprivation, researchers agree that poor sleep quality results in long-term consequences. CAPS psychologists and other researchers suggest that reducing stress is crucial to improving the quality of sleep.

“Stress-busters are limitless,” Leinberger said. “They can include physical exercise, as well as dance, yoga and stretching. Typically, the key to stress-busting lies in the commitment to engage in it, inspired by the belief in its efficacy.”

REBECCA SHRAGGE can be reached at campus@theaggie.org.

A recent study conducted by scientists at UC Davis and UCSF may bring dramatic changes to the future of HIV vaccine research.

The study, published Jan. 28, revealed that the current research method of focusing solely on the ability of the body’s CD8 +T cells to kill infected cells neglects other virus-suppressing elements of these cells that may be vital to the production of a successful vaccine, said Satya Dandekar, senior study author and professor and chair of UC Davis’s Department of Medical Microbiology and Immunology [CQ].

CD 8 +T cells, white blood cells in the body activated to fight off a virus, have always been known to profoundly affect HIV. A set of studies completed at Harvard several years ago revealed that the removal of CD8 +T cells from infected animals caused an increase in HIV levels. Consequently, researchers assumed CD8 +T cells directly sought out and killed cells infected with the HIV virus, said Joseph Wong, lead researcher and associate professor of medicine at UCSF [CQ].

A small population of those infected with HIV is able to live for many years without treatment before contracting AIDS, Dandekar said. CD8 +T cells are credited with allowing individuals to depress the progress of the virus.

Dandekar and Wong, along with UC Davis Health System researchers, sought to find direct evidence for this function of CD8 +T cells in their study. They began by removing these cells from infected rhesus monkeys, and followed this by treating the animals with HIV drugs designed to prevent new cells from becoming infected with the virus.

“The hypothesis was that if infected cells are being eliminated by CD8 +T cells, infected cells should live longer after the removal of these CD8 +T cells, and virus levels should not come down as quickly” Wong said.

The results proved the opposite, however. The removal of CD8 +T cells had no effect on the virus levels in the bloodstreams of the infected animals.

These findings disprove the traditional school of thought regarding the function of CD8 +T cells in controlling HIV.

“CD8 +T cells must be doing something to control virus production, but it’s not through the classical mechanism that everyone assumed,” Wong said. “We need to understand what else is in the toolbox of CD8 +T cells that allow them to inhibit the virus.”

The results call into question the current strategies for developing a successful HIV vaccine. An opinion piece in the PLOS Pathogens journal cited the study as proving the role of CD8 +T cells in HIV as a “known unknown.”

“We all agree that CD8 +T cells are extremely important in limiting infection, but the question is: Do we know everything they do to achieve that viral control?” Dandekar said. “The answer from our study is no, we are not measuring everything that they do.”

If further studies confirm these findings, CD8 +T cells can be analyzed to determine their beneficial effects on decreasing the levels of infected cells in the body, Wong said.

“We can go back to examining how CD8 +T cells are working, and at some point if basic observations find a promising new mechanism, it would be nice to see that developed on animals and then in human studies,” he said.

MEGAN MURPHY can be reached at campus@theaggie.org.

A 15-acre federal Superfund site on the edge of the UC Davis campus has been linked with cancer-causing carcinogenic chromium-6 contaminants.

The carcinogen, which has been linked with having high solubility rates, has been primarily noted to cause lung cancer.

The current contamination site was formerly home to the Laboratory for Energy-Related Health Research. The lab was in use from 1958 to 1988 and primarily studied the effects of radioactivity on animals. Many link the radioactive elements in use at this site to be the major proponent of the chromium, but scientists disagree.

“Our current theory is that organic waste deposited at one of the landfills decades ago acted to convert naturally occurring nontoxic chromium-3 into chromium-6,” said Sue Fields, environmental manager at the Office of Environmental Health and Safety at UC Davis in an e-mail interview.

Under oxidizing conditions, alkaline pH range, presence of manganese oxide and minerals containing chromium, chromium-3 is made into chromium-6.

Chromium-6 is a natural component of rocks in the mineral form of chromite. It is commonly found in the rock serpentine at the Sierra Hills and the Coast Ranges. From there it flows down the valleys and integrates into the soil. It can also be generated from industrial methods.

Some researchers believe this is how the contaminate made its way to the Superfund site.

“In and near the UC Davis campus, it was carried from the Coast Ranges largely as chromium-3 to the valley by Cache and Putah Creeks,” said Martin Goldhaber, a senior scientist of the U.S. geological survey in an e-mail interview.

The chromium-6 is primarily found in the groundwater, which poses a threat to the drinking water of residents in the Sacramento Valley. The reason for this is linked to the high solubility rate that chromium-6 has in comparison to chromium-3. According to the State Water Resources Control Board, drinking water can be treated by different pumps and treat remediation systems. Chromium-3 and chromium-6 can be removed by reverse osmosis or ion exchange resins.

However, UC Davis researchers say there is no indication that the contamination has affected drinking water in the Sacramento Valley.

Chromium-6 can also threaten health by means of inhalation. “Chromium-6 is known to cause lung cancer when breathed in as dust. There is no dispute about that,” Goldhaber said.

UC Davis researchers have begun efforts to clean up the contaminates by converting chromium-6 back into chromium-3 by pumping calcium polysulfide into the soil, Fields said. The pilot project was recently launched.

Calcium polysulfide can re-oxidize chromium-6 to chromium-3 by producing aqueous manganese.

The project hopes to submit a plan for clean-up to the federal Environmental Protection Agency this fall.

SADAF MOGHIMI can be reached at campus@theaggie.org.

UC Davis research monitoring the flow of viruses from animals to humans is helping scientists ward off global epidemics.

At the quarterly “Evening with an Aggie” event, hosted by the Student Alumni Association (SAA), co-director of the UC Davis Wildlife Health Center Dr. Jonna Mazet will discuss UC Davis’ role in the effort to prevent the next pandemic. The event will take place tonight at the AGR conference room at the Walter A. Buehler Alumni and Visitors Center from 7 to 8:30 p.m.

“Dr. Mazet is a four degree holder of UC Davis and her innovative research is at the forefront of global efforts to avert the next pandemic,” said SAA advisor Jane Eadie. “And Dr. Mazet is just one of many UC Davis graduates whose research is making a difference in their fields. Our illustrious alumni are an inspiration and something for all of us to be proud of.”

Recognizing the threat of global pandemics, the U.S. Agency for International Development launched its Emerging Pandemic Threats (EPT) program, which consists of five different projects that work together to prevent infectious diseases.

Mazet’s research falls under the PREDICT project, which focuses on the role of wildlife in facilitating the spread of new diseases. The UC Davis School Wildlife Health center received a 75 million dollar grant from the EPT program to help fund and advance this area of research.

“To establish and maintain global pathogen surveillance, we will work directly with local governments and conservation organizations to build or expand programs in wildlife and human health,” Mazet said in a press release. “Together we want to stop the next HIV. This collaborative approach is key to PREDICT’s success.”

Junior alumni coordinator of SAA Kamry Zhang organized and implemented tonight’s event with the additional help of the SAA board of directors. “Evening with an Aggie” is a quarterly student-run event that invites UC Davis alumni to campus to share their research with current students. The event has been implemented over the last seven years.

“The event was formerly known as the Alumni Panel where we invited alumni to talk to students about their careers,” Zhang said. “Evening with an Aggie only [presents] one alumnus at a time so that students and alumni can have more interaction time. It’s important to maintain ties with our alumni because it gives students the opportunity to network and know the kinds of careers available.”

REBECCA SHRAGGE can be reached at campus@theaggie.org.