A new paper, led by first author David Horner (COPSAC, Copenhagen University Hospital) and co-authored by GLUCOTYPES researcher Jordi Merino and Morten Arendt Rasmussen from the BUGS4URATE team, has been published in Sleep, one of the leading journals in sleep research. The study tracked 206 healthy adolescents over two weeks, combining continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) with objective sleep measurement to explore how nightly sleep duration shapes next-day glucose patterns in real-life conditions.
The findings reveal a bidirectional relationship between day-to-day sleep duration and daytime glycaemia: longer sleep was associated with lower glucose variability and reduced risk of extreme glucose excursions the following day, while greater daytime glucose variability predicted shorter sleep the following night.
The study also identified awakening as a key physiological window linking sleep and glucose regulation, as the early-morning pre-wake glucose rise the early-morning pre-wake glucose rise partially mediated the association between sleep duration and next-day glycaemia, identifying
This publication is also a tangible outcome of the EIC Pathfinder Precision Nutrition Portfolio‘s Technology Synergies Working Group, which brings together researchers across the Portfolio’s projects to share methods and develop new collaborations.
“Understanding complex diseases requires collaboration across disciplines. By bringing together complementary expertise through the Precision Nutrition Portfolio, we can generate new biological insights and accelerate the development of precision nutrition solutions for better metabolic health.” — Jordi Merino, GLUCOTYPES Coordinator
Reference: David Horner, Kristen Evensen, Zhi Ye, Marie Jahn, Kaare Tranæs, Jonathan Thorsen, Thomas Ragnar Wood, Kristi Storoschuk, Nanette Mol Debes, Jannet Svensson, Jordi Merino, Rikke Beck Jensen, Thomas A Jepps, David S Ludwig, Ruth J F Loos, Klaus Bønnelykke, Rebecca Vinding, Morten Arendt Rasmussen, Night-to-Night Sleep Duration and Wake-Anchored Glycaemia: Associations with Continuous Glucose Monitoring in Free-Living Adolescents, Sleep, 2026;, zsag158, https://doi.org/10.1093/sleep/zsag158
