TIME is reporting that a new study found that playing precisely timed bursts of a sound known as pink noise while people slept changed the flow of fluid within their brains. It said more research is needed, but the study authors hope the finding may one day lead to a non-invasive way to make sleep more refreshing.
TIME said two of the study's authors, Laura Lewis of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Josh Levitt of Boston University, examined what happened to the sleeping brain when pink noise was played during a certain type of brain wave. Levitt said a substantial body of literature links sounds and slow waves, and that slow waves may be tied to a sensory gating response that keeps the brain from waking to every sound in the environment. Lewis said some things must wake a sleeper while others must be slept through, and noted that rhythmic noise, such as shushing a baby, can influence sleep. She said the study was a proof-of-concept conducted in healthy young to midlife participants, and that the researchers now want to see whether the algorithm can be improved for people with sleep disorders or for people who may be aging.
TIME also reported on new research from the Guttmacher Institute, a nonprofit focused on reproductive rights, estimating that removing Planned Parenthood health centers from the publicly funded contraceptive care system would reduce access in counties home to 12.4 million women who need such care. It said lawmakers and activists opposed to abortion have long lobbied for that change.
Separately, TIME cited the World Health Organization in reporting that the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo continues to expand, and that roughly 48% of people who get the disease die, a higher fatality rate than in previous outbreaks.
TIME also reported that choirs are attracting a new generation of singers amid political division, and that a patient shared the story of part of his skull ending up on the floor during a 16-hour brain surgery.