Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams

The first sleep book by a leading scientific expert- Professor Matthew Walker, Director of the Sleep and Neuroimaging Lab at UC Berkeley - reveals his groundbreaking exploration of sleep, explaining how we can harness its transformative power to change our lives for the better.

1. Sleep is one of the most important but least understood aspects of our lives, health and longevity. Until very recently, science has been trying to understand why we sleep, what it helps, and why we suffer such devastating health effects when we don't sleep, compared to other basic drives in life - eating, drinking, regenerating - the purpose of sleep has remained elusive.

But the explosion of scientific discoveries over the past 20 years has shed new light on this fundamental aspect of our lives. Now, Matthew Walker, a distinguished neuroscientist and sleep expert, gives us a new understanding of the importance of sleep and dreams. In the brain, among so many other things, sleep enriches our ability to learn, memorize and make logical decisions. It recalibrates our emotions, restocks our immune system, fine-tunes our metabolism and regulates our appetite. Dreaming mollifies painful memories and creates a virtual reality space where the brain fuses past and present knowledge to inspire creativity.

Walker answers an important question about sleep: How does caffeine and alcohol affect sleep? What really happens during Rem sleep? Why do our sleep patterns change over a lifetime? How do common sleep aids affect us, and can they do long-term damage? Walker, charting cutting-edge scientific breakthroughs and integrating clinical practice with decades of research, utilizes sleep to improve learning, mood, energy levels and Hol; enhance the education and longevity of our children and boost efficiency, success and productivity in our business. Clear-eyed, attractive and highly accessible, why we sleep is an important explanation for sleep that will forever change the listener's mind on the subject.